The bird that earned me $87

I suppose you could say that nature helps me earn my living, for which, as a struggling writer, I’ve often been grateful. There was once even a particular bird that directly earned me eighty-seven dollars and seven cents. The moment is still vivid enough in my mind that, as a sort of “paradigm” for writers, I think it is worth recording.

I had taken my work to some coastal parkland for the day. (Getting outdoors to write is something I heartily recommend.) I could feel the air around my ears. I could see large stretches of grass, trees, sky and sea. Suddenly, this bird arrived. I can’t remember what I was actually working on that day, but the bird immediately captured my attention. It was a smallish black-and-white bird, utterly vivacious and curious. If you’re from Australia, you’ll almost certainly recognise the Willy Wagtail. If you’re from elsewhere, I’ve provided a photo to give you an idea what it looks like. It gets its name from its constantly waggling tail, but it’s not just its tail that moves. It does everything in a flurry of movement, back and forth, darting up and down; its arrival is full of drama. So, with my pen already in my hand, I stopped what I was writing and scrawled down ideas for a poem. The final poem began like this:
                       
                        He arrived in a fluster,
                        his tail swivelling like a weather-vane,
                        inky black over a snow-white undercarriage,
                        and for a small, flickering moment,
                        all was pandemonium upon the lawn.

That was the first stanza, and there were two others, both of five lines, where the predominant image was of a helicopter coming to land (“blades churning, sleek lines trembling”) and then taking off again.

I chose to write in free verse for this poem. It seemed to fit the randomness of the arrival and of the bird’s movement. And I wrote in short phrases, each one overtaking the next; this wasn’t (as far as I remember) a conscious choice, but of course it fit. It was probably intuitive. The words came together, and I finished the poem soon afterwards and sent it to The School Magazine, who paid me $87.07 for a one-time usage. They commissioned an illustrator called Matt Ottley to illustrate it, and he painted a wonderful Willy Wagtail juxtaposed with a helicopter in the background.

I still sometimes visit that spot on the coast. And I always remember the bird that arrived and earned me eighty-seven dollars. The meeting, which only lasted a few minutes, has remained a great encouragement. It taught me that poems can arrive when you are not at all expecting them, if you only have your pen in hand and are willing to write them down. It can even pay!