David Chadwick

A poem for the month - November

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What’s in a name?

Dave is no kind of name for a duck.

Donald perhaps, as in Donald Trump,

Dave Duck, I’m afraid, just doesn’t sound right.

But Dave’s his name, they said to us,

and his feathery mate they’d christened Thea,

which we both thought was fair enough –

that is a duckish name, perhaps,

unless, of course, she is a he,

and they’re too young to tell that yet.

You’d need to be a real expert,

you’d need to be a sexer

of fowl, and I’ve never had that ambition,

so we will have to wait and see.

We took possession of the pair

from Alys and Simcha, it seems they were

surplus to requirements (the birds of course).

“We’ll take them,” we said. “It’ll be fine”,

got them home, consulted Birds Online –

Muscovy, “large goose-like ducks” it said.

Anyway, long story short, we changed their names.

First Dave became Dilly, a ducky moniker,

but then Thea, we thought, just did not go

with Dilly – Dally would be much better,

and luckily it has the same first letter.

But they did not … dilly or dally that is.

We let them out for a little free ranging

and no sooner had we turned our backs

than they lit out for home – sunny Ōtaki.

Karen found them heading north

through the fields, they sallied forth,

their little heads just visible

above the yellow stalks of grass.

Fortunately they’d not worked out

the purpose of those two appendages

attached on each side of their bodies.

They were planning to walk back home.

We returned them as the sun was setting

to their pen in the berry patch, behind the netting,

where, from now on, they will pass their days,

until they lose the memory of their old life

and the deep-seated urge to roam –

forget that they were once called Thea and Dave,

and think of this as home.