Bird bath, ‘alsung’

By Al S. Mendoza

I WATCH birds come and go. Literally. That’s because I have a bird bath in my backyard. 

It’s been there for ten years.

I can see it from my bedroom window. 

I can see it from my meal table.

I can see it from my writing room.

Made of clay, the bird bath, rectangular-shaped, measures 6 x 12 (inches).  Depth: 3 inches.  Water level: 2-1/2 inches.

Perrocas, sparrows, maya-mayas and maria cafras love to bathe in my bird bath, especially in summer.

They rarely come visiting in the rainy season and, when they do, they dive swiftly and fly away as quickly, flapping their wings in glee.

My thrill is, I enjoy watching them do their thing. 

They don’t see me at all. 

I peep from my bedroom window, the curtains covering everything in me except my eyes.

I can see most of them almost each morning while I sip my coffee on the breakfast table.

I can see them, too, when I write my columns from the workshop.  When a word is too hard to find, or a line too difficult to tackle, I just pause a little, look at them, and the problem is solved.

The perrocas (their song goes kro-ko-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu), ah, they have lovely eyebrows.

Almost, I can’t take my eyes out of the maria cafras.  Their long tail, black and white, keeps swaying as in a salsa dance while they are perched on the ledge of the bird bath.  Before every dip, they love to sit on a twig of the mahogany, macopa, guatis or lanzones tree gracing the backyard.

Who says Mother Nature has stopped smiling in the Big City?

My bird bath sits on the edge of a boat-shaped wood that we call “alsung.” 

I found the “alsung” abandoned in one corner of an inconsequential lot in a barrio called Bogtong Silag in Mangatarem, not far from the street where I was born.

I was gawking at the “alsung” when Mang Marceling, the owner of the lot, popped in from behind.  Mang Marceling has been a “glassmate” from way back; still is.

“You like it?” he asked.

Before I could answer, he said, “You can have it.”

I hired a jeepney to load the “alsung” and, in a jiffy, it’s in my backyard in the Big City.

“My pen name (Alsung) that won me a poetry award in college,” I told my Sol, the sunshine of my life.  “My humble gift to you this Christmas.”

An eternal admirer of the culture and the arts, Sol was swept off her feet.  To her, the “alsung” is a “timeless work of art.”

This particular “alsung,” which was used by our old folk to pound palay to extract rice, must be a hundred years old or so.

It has become the accent of the backyard, with my bonsais playing second fiddle to it.

The birth bath and the “alsung” – they have good chemistry.  Together with “my birds,” they play nice music together.

(For past columns, click http://sundaypunch.prepys.com/archives/category/opinion/general-admission/ Readers may reach columnist at also147@yahoo.com . For reactions to this column, click “Send MESSAGES, OPINIONS, COMMENTS” on default page.)

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