DISTURBANCE

i flash around the blind corner into eymore close
gathering speed as i ease into the morning commute
all ten minutes of it
just enough to get the heart pumping and the blood racing
as i execute the steep two-minute climb
from bournville police station
up to the brow of the hill into selly oak
but not normally quite enough to break into a sweat
and as i flash around the blind corner
in my peripheral vision
i spy a blurred bright green form
which takes startled wing from the grass verge to my left
it is a green woodpecker
fleeing this mad assailant
it takes off in my direction of travel
struggling to put distance
between me and its fluttering tail feathers
it rejects the branches of a hornbeam tree fifty yards on
swerving around it as it issues a loud warning cry
then up and over the houses it soars
and disappears into the wood which borders manor farm park