A Flight, December 2014

I am at a threshold experience that I long to share. Come with me please to marvel at a bird sanctuary less than an hour from the urban sprawl of Albuquerque where I live.  It is the time of the annual festival of the Sandhill Cranes, they migrate south along the Rio Grande River corridor from northern states to winter in the fields here in New Mexico.  Many who live here or travel to see them love the sound of their unique call as they fly over, reminding us of the ancient cycles of nature as the season shifts.  

We drive into the refuge area, just off the highway to the Bernardo Wildlife Area, I was unaware of this refuge until my friend brought me there yesterday.  We witness the elegant spectacle of hundreds of the Greater Cranes in the fields in the late afternoon on an overcast day, cool enough for a coat and hat.  We walk and talk of personal things, stories of our childhoods, memories of years gone by, while around our conversation a certain crescendo of glory is building up.  We spot a small grouping of mule deer among the cranes, they look toward us, as we look to them.  What does their shy manner speak to the cranes? They do not appear to fear each other as they mingle together in the fields; fur and antlers with feathers and long beaks.  Tenderly, the deer edge out from the trees at the end of the day, magnificent creatures, especially the males with their large treelike racks.  A good writer is encouraged to use descriptive adjectives to feed the reader a sense of the picture, but I know this picture- a technicolor movie really- is beyond my capability to paint in black and white or color, in words or diagrams.  But never-the-less, I am compelled to try. 

We walk awhile and then drive the loop road around the refuge spotting a red-tail hawk and later perhaps the same bird with it's mate on a telephone pole.  Around the horizon of the fields of corn, planted for the cranes to feed on are mountain views-blue violet silhouettes, Manzano Peak to the east. We are only an hour before the fly-in, when the birds move at dusk from the fields to the safety of a marsh to roost for the night.  There they will stand in the shallow waters until sunrise.  This evening ritual is a massive migration as hundreds of these great soaring ones, a nature film of flight, create a spectacle of sheer delight. My friend and I station ourselves at the north edge of one of the observation blinds and watch awestruck as the cranes float in while the setting sun glows dimmer with the last Naples yellow rays streaking the skies.  All the while an unusual rainbow ball of hues-red, orange, yellow, blue- appears to sit on top of the mountain range to the south and incredibly reflects into the marsh waters in front of us like a finger of God. The cranes call a chant to one another in a haunting baritone sound. Their chords touch our souls as we watch spellbound until the black-ink marsh is full with their bodies. Are you with me? Their legs come down to land first as they descend, their huge wings like parachutes glide them into place. They settle in as more then more, surely a thousand crowd together for the night to unfold. I am on safari in a sacred place. As the sun slips away my intuition tells me to turn around and walk away from the marsh to see the last cranes, the later arrivals coming in over head from the east.  At first I ignore this inner voice but it continues and I tell Elise I am going to walk back toward the car. I take a short path to an open field and look up to see their massive wing spans- six or eight feet across-so close I can hear them beat the air above, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh. And then, to the east above the purple mountain range I see the full moon has just risen amongst the lavender cloud cover. Brilliant, it slips like a jewel in and out of view:  punctuating eternal.  I stop breathing.  I am one with it all, there is no separation, only amazement.  My mouth drops open as I marvel for some minutes, frozen in place to take it in, this sensory soaring sight. Then I long to share this with my friend; I turn and run back to where she is standing with her camera at the edge of the marsh. "Come quick! Come with me please." Come feast on this extraordinary, non-ordinary reality around us, and be humbled in speechless revery. For a few precious minutes, we transcend the physical, we become cranes and fly.

 Photo by Elise Varnadoe