Crow is one of my guides this summer.
A pair of crows has been nesting nearby, and for the first time I have had the opportunity to witness their family life up close. I live in a neighbourhood with tree-lined streets, and the birds are an ongoing source of joy: the robins leading the dawn chorus, the return of the geese, the bright flash of blue jays, the chatter and swagger of magpies, and the steady presence of crows in the tall evergreens.
I am familiar with the crows’ louder voices. I know the calls they make when they summon their companions to join them in a game of king of the castle at the top of the spruce trees. I recognize their shout-outs to neighbours spread across the blocks around me. I have often witnessed their territorial songs and dances with the magpies as they claim the best trees of the moment.
But this spring, I saw something different. Or perhaps I heard something different: the quieter voice beneath the familiar call.
I was delighted to watch a pair of crows courting in a tree in my yard. Their movements were gentle and deliberate. Their calls were softer than the ones I usually hear, almost private. These were behaviours I had never noticed before.
Once their bond was secure, the tree provided just the right sticks for the nest they were building nearby.
For weeks, they were simply a pair. Not part of a large, noisy gathering. Not a murder of crows, with all the drama that word carries. Just two crows moving through the neighbourhood together, gathering, building, tending to what was becoming.
Now there are three of them.
It took me a while to notice because they are so quiet.
I am used to more noise from the neighbourhood corvids.
Right now, the young magpies are big enough to fly, and everywhere I go they are shadowing their parents and begging for food. Their plaintive feed me, feed me cries remind me of the bottomless hunger of teenage boys.
Soon the blue jay parents will bring their broods around to learn the nearby harvesting sites. They will spend time in the two small oak trees, imprinting them onto their mental maps, and then return in a few weeks when the acorns are larger. They’ll strip the trees in a loud, chattering group, constantly checking to see whether parents or siblings are nearby.
The crows are different.
They are silent in the trees overhead.
Silent as they roost companionably.
Silent as they snack on elm seeds.
Even silent as the young crow opens wide to be fed.
I am deeply touched that I get to witness this small part of their family life. I watch the subtle movement of the parent’s beak to a spot along the young one’s mouth, the tiny gesture that triggers feeding. I watch them sit together at the top of the west side of the tree, preening in the late evening sunlight.
All of it taking place in silence.
And because they are silent, I have to remember to look up.
I have to pause long enough to notice the movement in the leaves, the dark shapes balanced high above me, the quiet exchange of care taking place over my head.
It makes me wonder how much we miss when we move through the world in tune with the loudest voices.
How much tenderness is unfolding quietly nearby?
How much of my inner voice is being overshadowed by the louder voice of doubt?
How often is life asking us not to search harder, but simply to become quiet enough to hear?
