Two Found Poems

Rearranged words from a ground-breaking ornithologist.

Birds of Western Canada, published in the 1920s by the Canadia Department of Mines (why?) as a companion volume to Birds of Eastern Canada (and combined into simply Birds of Canada in 1928) was the work of Percy Algernon Tavener, the first ornithologist* at the National Museum of Canada, with illustrations by Allan Brooks.

Taverner’s descriptions of the birds goes far beyone those found in modern bird books, with some nearly lyrical. All the words here are Tavener’s: I’ve just selected and rearranged them.

*Taverner trained as an architect, and worked as one. But his legacy is as a self-taught naturalist/ornithologist, not only for his position at the National Museum, but also as president of the Ottawa Field Naturalists’ Club in the 1930s, founding its journal, The Canadian Field-Naturalist; for helping to convince the Canadian Government to sign the 1916 Canada-U.S. Migratory Birds Convention, and for being instrumental in the establishment of the birding mecca of Point Pelee National Park, and several bird sanctuaries across Canada.

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