Thank you, Geelong Writers Ekphrastic Challenge fans! You have risen to the Challenge again. Selected for publication below are twenty-one entries to the Nests (#2 2025) challenge.
In addition, received from Tony B. for our collective amusement, was an alternate and topical six-word caption for the image: ‘Housing Crisis: A Bird’s Eye View’.
The twenty-one submissions below carried converging themes of seasonal change, tree tops, abandonment, and corvid – and other – life cycles.
We congratulate the following authors for their original contributions:
Catherine Mahar Allan Barden Ian Stewart Adam Stone Gail Griffin Bev Blaskett
David Bridge John Heritage Geoff Gaskill Howard Osborne Julie Edmonds
Jan Price Dulara J. Deb Lucas Pauline Rimmer Steve Gray
Jesse Harman John Margetts Saakhi B.
Glen Donaldson Aditya K.
A Murder of Crows
The farm yard was wet with the long months of winter and the hills grey and misty past the wall. Her feet in the old boots sank into the icy mud and came out reluctantly. There were the cows to milk, the pigs to feed, the orphan lambs to bottle feed, the few eggs from the winter-bedraggled hens to collect, all that getting and eating.
Inside the house the peat fire stuttered along, spitefully burning brightly when she lit it but dying down to ash if she left it. Oh well, his dinner would have to be yesterday’s potatoes and turnips again, burned on the bottom from the fire leaping up while her back was turned, and cold now. He would be wild. Can you not make a man some dinner, he would shout. If she said nothing he would throw something. If she replied he would throw something. Best to leave it on the table and go out to the sheltered upper field where the first snowdrops were coming through.
She heard the cawing of rooks (Corvus frugilegus) and paused with a bucket in each hand to look up at the rookery. Her pale face was made beautiful by the cold air. A clamour, a storytelling and, even better, a parliament of rooks. The chirruping noise of their calls in the rookery warmed her heart, more than that peat fire ever would, and she could see the first branchers out of the nest teetering about on the nearest twigs.
She had seen rooks cracking acorns in the autumn. Clever birds. But they hadn’t known spring was late this year and their children would not fly away. There would be a murder of crows with no children. Like her, no children, just the getting and eating and maybe a murder.
By Catherine Mahar
Max Magpie
Every spring, like clockwork, Max returns. His black-and-white plumage gleams in the sunlight as he perches on our neighbour Jennie’s old oak tree, watching over his mate rebuild their nest. Max has never swooped at me. Instead he observes with his sharp eyes and tilts his head in recognition. It’s as if we share an unspoken understanding.
This rare bond with Max reminds me of my childhood in country Tasmania, where magpies were both feared and admired. Some of my childhood friends collected birds’ eggs —magpie eggs included. I joined in for a short time but it never sat quite right with me. There was something sacred about a nest. I preferred to watch rather than disturb. While my friends compared their finds, I marvelled at the way magpies soared across the paddocks, their keen eyes missing nothing.
One magpie in particular took an interest in me. With my mum’s encouragement I would leave small treats at the base of a large gum tree near our house. Over time, the bird began to recognize me. It never swooped – only watched from a distance. Like Max, it must have realised that I was no threat.
Now, years later, Max carries on this legacy of trust. While others duck and weave when they walk, run or cycle our street, wary of Max’s sharp beak and swift wings, I stroll by without a second thought. He knows me, and I know him.
Sometimes Max drifts down to warble at me as I pass Jenny’s house. Sometimes we chat. Occasionally, in a show of trust, his mate and their fledgings join him. Not once have I felt threatened.
And no, I don’t barrack for Collingwood!
by Allan Barden
Mid-winter
A tree, its branches bare, reaches dolefully up, hoping to trick the sun into smiling. It won’t. This is winter, after all.
The branches harbour seven nests, empty in this season. The farm buildings give out the feeling of desertion. Are there animals sheltering within? Or are there none, the place abandoned?
Let us not be overwhelmed by the sense the scene seems to evoke. After all, this is northern Europe, probably rural Britain. The cycle of the seasons edges from the bleak cold of Winter into the promise of Spring. We, and the farmers, know from years of experience that those bare branches will soon thrust out new life, as they always do. The seven nests, so vulnerable as home for their birds right now, will be enveloped, hidden, in a cascade of new greenery; they will welcome back their builders and owners – rooks or crows perhaps – to the very places they farewelled when last Autumn gave them the nod and sent them south.
The pairs, returning, make nest repairs, find Spring fodder in bursting array, then turn thoughts to family matters. Nods and winks (if that’s what corvids do!) translate into mating, followed by a clutch of eggs – maybe as many as seven, blue-green in colour if they are rooks – to give meaning to this natural, recurring cycle.
Chicks mature, leave the nest; parents begin the task of preparing for a new phase, the next inevitable cyclic moment. Autumn rushes by and they are off south again, their job done. For this season.
They will be back.
By Ian Stewart
Crib Of Aves
With thunder in our
hearts
Lightning in our
wings
We forage, scrimp and
save
Our threats are multifarious and
eternal
Leaves on the tree fall and leave us
exposed
Still, we
endure
We protect with all our feathers and
fibre
Fight to
survive
Keep our babies
alive
Just like you
do
by Adam Stone
Nests
Babushka dolls. Those colourful, wooden Russian dolls that decrease in size as they nest, one inside another. Traditionally, they were used to represent the unity of mind, soul, heart, body and spirit that contributes to a collective sense of connection and belonging. Seen as being a symbolic extension of each family’s generational matriarchs birthing children, the layers also represent the handing down of legacies, reflected in patterns of thoughts, emotions, actions, personalities, lifestyles and even career choices.
Family ‘nests’ are created to nurture and care for the young whether they’re born into nuclear, single-parent, multigenerational, blended or skipped generational families. And, like nests, there is an unlimited variety of nests available. Some expensive and grand. Others modest and minimalistic. Some hastily built. Others lovingly crafted. Some owned for years. Others used and afterwards exchanged for others. Each setting makes a unique contribution to its family members’ acquisition and development of communication, values, beliefs and relationship dynamics—both positively and negatively—to make the multilayered individuals who make up our population.
Whilst some have thrived upon their inherited or lived experiences of positive intergenerational patterns, others less fortunate have had to struggle to overcome multiple disadvantages and negative patterns. However, all is not lost. Identifying unwanted intergenerational patterns is the first step in breaking successive negative traits found in dysfunctional relationships, mental health issues, addiction and substance abuse. Not all family traditions or life journeys are worth repeating. Influencers with broader cultural and societal norms of empathy, kindness and practical, financial assistance can help to lessen the burdens of those with inherited vulnerability and hardship.
Regardless of what nests we’ve been raised in, we have the power to accept or change the future. Identify the intergenerational patterns that are worth repeating. Cast aside those that no longer serve your purpose.
by Gail Griffin
Marginal
The houses were long abandoned, but for some reason the crows returned, year after year. The people had been dispersed by a landowner intent on exercising his rights to evict. His tenants could barely scrape together a living, let alone pay the rent. The crows in the trees had a more secure existence. The landlord, insisting he was no charity, ordered bailiffs to deliver him a clear run of his land.
Some of the people had no option but to offer themselves to the Church; some who knew of distant relatives went begging to them; some young ones held plans for future advancement – even migration to America! – and chanced themselves to the road; while others who had been too proud, prizing their independence too highly, had stepped off the edge of the earth.
Seven families had boarded their curraghs, paddling to islands beyond the land’s western extremities. Previously they did not venture onto those treeless, windswept rocks unless summer was on its way, because only the seals’ arrival made the turbulent crossing worthwhile; now they were taking up permanent residence, knowing that each winter would mean privation. Scant pasture land could maintain only a few lean sheep.
The island life was precarious; the sea always treacherous; the population was ageing. Here there was no boss; nor was there a doctor, nor any social services. Every day began with examining the rocks, in hope that new flotsam would somehow add food to the table; a shipwreck might yield a fortune. But treasure remained elusive. By the mid-1950s, the last inhabitants had departed.
Well before, perhaps five generations ago, one of my forebears had left for England, renouncing his island links.
Generation after generation since have disavowed those despised origins. Only the family name endures, to betray its Irish ancestry.
by Bev Blaskett
Season’s End
It was a bleak place, particularly in winter: storehouses with decaying tin roofs, stone walls and hammered earth floors straddled the chained iron gate to the property. Crow Wood latticed the immediate sky with denuded branches hosting a scattering of abandoned nests. The absence of the mournful cries of their summertime inhabitants compounded the loneliness.
This was a forced homecoming. I had grown up here, tottered my first steps not fifty strides from where I stood, but I hadn’t been sad to bid farewell to my father’s prodding to ‘shape up or shift out.’ My mother had lasted until I was twelve and did her best to hold us together, but it was a task that broke her finally. She was in no state to look after herself let alone me, so her sister took her in and I stayed, growing progressively more resentful.
He was not a brute of a man but given to a bitterness that made him loom, even when seated. By fifteen, I was as tall and broader, and itching to pay back years of tongue lashing. Had I anything heavier than a broom in hand when my control finally gave way, I would have likely ended my life then. As it was, I raised weals on his arms and neck. It was an awakening moment for both of us, and I left the same day.
It was a terrible way to fly free but, despite stumbles, I found my spirit lifted by independence and prospered, modestly. My aunt’s news of my father’s passing was my sole reason for this return. I had no intention of claiming territory, merely to take a last look confirming my decision. Unlike the crows, my seasons here were over.
by David Bridge
a site
has been chosen
materials gathered
construction begins
from inherited plans
to support
and nurture
family
by John Heritage
Brownie Box
My brother Septimus was born the year my mother gave me an old brownie box camera for my birthday.
She did it to distract me. As the eldest of her children, I was aware that her pregnancy was difficult because it kept her bedridden most of that year. ‘That camera will give you an interest,’ she told me. ‘And to take your mind off things.’
I cared about my mother as much as I didn’t care about my impending new brother or sister’s arrival. From the moment I laid eyes on that camera, I was infatuated. While I snapped pictures of everything and anything, I didn’t really know what on earth I was doing.
For good measure, I never questioned how the film in the camera never seemed to run out, or how all those pictures I did take, appeared in the mail all developed and ready to stick into the photograph album that my mother said was the other part of my birthday present. ‘You’ll look back in years to come and remember the good times,’ she said.
Most of those early photos came back as little more than black or white blobs or blurry smudges. Then one day I opened a package to find I’d somehow captured a picture of a tree in our backyard. In the tree were seven nests.
My mother, always superstitious where numbers were concerned, regarded seven as magical. She was one of seven children and the child she was carrying was her seventh. ‘We’re going to call him Septimus, if he’s a boy, Septima if she’s a girl,’ she told me. ‘And those seven nests you photographed are a lucky omen.’
Luck proved fickle when she died giving Septimus a life. Good luck for him, bad luck for everyone else.
by Geoff Gaskill
The Year to Come
Nests built high up in the branches of a tree
A fine year to come, some birds may foresee
More than a wish, of what the Spring will be
That sixth sense allows a few birds to prepare
As Winter’s chill has stripped all back to bare
Stark in silhouette, yet is a statement of hope
Driven by instinct, nests built near to the sky
Trusting the Spring will wave winter goodbye
And fledglings to know when it is time to fly
For now, they are empty but soon to be full
As mating will be soon, and feeling that pull
With nests all ready, and sure they will cope
by Howard Osborne
Abandoned
He abandoned her and their two-year-old daughter.
She was twenty-five.
He’d taken his belongings and was gone when she arrived home from work.
She’d trusted him.
A cheque for $10,000, half their savings, was under a fridge magnet.
They’d found sanctuary
behind the peeling-paint walls and beneath the leaky roof
of their two-bedroomed rental in a town edged by forest.
Their shared love of nature had coloured her life.
She’d felt secure and loved.
Until betrayal drained her, greyscaled and bared her like winter trees emptied of leaves.
Her life became the remnants of a deserted place where life once thrived.
The town had brought stillness to her; now, it amplified her desolation.
Sanctuary lost.
Yet, she continued working and caring for her daughter, supported by family and friends.
Feelings of security slowly returned.
She acquired a loan, purchased treed land,
drew a design, and hired a builder to build a house for herself and her daughter.
They spent their first night in their new home,
sheltered beneath its tin roof, protected by its brick walls,
with the smell of fresh paint and the creaking of timber settling in.
Change had reshaped her; she adapted to it and felt strong. Stillness returned to her life.
She scattered their land with seeds and bulbs.
Sanctuary refound.
(The daughter grew up receiving care, love, and support from many places and people.
She graduated from university and married.
They created a home where they nurtured their children to independence).
Her daughter and grandchildren were loved, secure, and thriving.
So, she started a new job, pursued her studies and found love, trust, commitment,
and a shared love of nature with a new partner.
And the remnants of her life reconfigured in colour,
flourishing like trees and flowers in spring.
by Julie Edmonds
Where?
Where is this
familiar scene –
South East
North West?
Something about
this rough-bricked
old house
with a vacant front
doorway
recalls a memory
from months ago –
where once
bags of birdseed
might have been
stored.
Where once
an aged man came
with blond grandson
each a cup in hand
to dip deep for seed
carry it carefully out
as if life depended
on every morsel.
The old man to circle
spread the grain
upon the new grass
and the boy to fill
the windowsill
of the second house
in which both sat
on upturned stumps –
the old man playing
his mouthorgan
and the smiling boy
watching us being fed
by our mothers
through
the glassless window
when
our nests were disguised
by thousands of leaves.
But now I see the trees
are barren and seven nests
are fodder for winter
and beyond the trees
English houses
upon houses.
Pray tell me!
Where is this
familiar scene –
South East
North West?
I’m searching
for my mother!
by Jan Price ©
Burning Eternal
bare branches snake
through silver-mist choked sky,
like the veins thrumming beneath the skin of my wrist
nests of brambles nestled in their wintry boughs,
cradling the cycle of life within
their soft, downy, feather-lined cribs
within the icy twigs trembling in the winter breeze,
frost glazing the bark,
lies the most fiery creature
whose flames melt the frost and scorch the wood
rise, little phoenix
from your ashy eyrie,
for with the cycle of nature, follows your own
with winter you crumble,
and spring you are born anew,
To burst into the brightest flames and soar the sky,
So bright that the common folk down low,
earth-bound mortals,
mistake you for a galactic star,
thinking that this blinding ball of light,
Is the Sun,
and you, oh benevolent Phoenix,
Take pity on these mortals who have never seen anything
glorious as you,
and take your place as the Beacon Of Light
that washes away darkness.
You are the beacon,
Burning eternal.
by Dulara J.
Silk and Nylon
It evokes a drop of fear
A shudder…
Like my Dad might appear
As a jongen, buzzing
Fear tinged with excitement
War planes overhead
Listening for the crash
As there always is one
Seeing the parachutes
Smelling fear in the air
Silk and nylon shot to ribbons
A shrill staccato the sound
A man dropping like a stone
To the hard frozen ground
“Don’t bring him back!”
Desperation, “you musn’t!”
“Someone else will take him,
you need not know who”
Mamma pleading, trepidation
Just in case…
The remnants later
Still hanging in the trees
Like abandoned crows nests
In the starkness of winter
by Deb Lucas
My Empty Nest
Twenty years had passed since I last stood here. I still felt my grandmother’s presence in the abandoned buildings. The empty windows stared accusingly at me. Where have you been? It was not mine any more. The property had been sold, and a big house stood where I had played and ridden my pony. I wandered through the small stone cottage, yet it seemed like a mansion when I was little. The barn next door still showed my scratched initials in a beam, and I recalled my joy at feeding a greedy orphaned lamb under Pa’s guidance.
This had been my sanctuary, and every holiday was spent surrounded by nature and my grandparents’ love. I was devastated when we moved overseas to start a new life. I missed the old one and especially missed my grandparents. I had only seen them once more when we had flown thousands of miles to revisit our homeland. Gran and Pa seemed so frail and elderly. I remember thinking my hugs would break their ribs, but they hugged me back so fiercely it made me weep.
I mentally shook myself and stood back to look at my childhood haven. The trees I had climbed were still here, and the birds had returned to build their nests. A new cycle had begun, and it was time for me to let go, too.
by Pauline Rimmer
The Nests of Discontent
Winter holds fast, its fingers deep in the earth, gripping stone and soil with an icy resolve. The world is silent beneath its weight, muffled by snow, hardened by frost. High in the trees, nests sit empty, brittle and bare, clinging to skeletal branches like forgotten promises.
The sky hangs low, heavy with bitterness, the air thick with foreboding. The sun is a pale spectre, offering no warmth, no comfort. Each breath is a struggle, each step an echo against hard surfaces—frozen ground, ice-slicked roads, walls that trap the cold within.
Is death here, hiding in the shadows of leafless trees, creeping along the edges of sight? Or is it merely waiting, patient, knowing the season is its ally? The days stretch long and lifeless, a cycle of gray mornings and endless nights. When will it all end?
Yet, beneath the frost, something stirs. A whisper in the roots, a pulse in the quiet. Hope is not gone—it lingers, unseen but certain. The warmth will return, slow at first, uncertain, but inevitable. The ice will crack, the rivers will flow, and the nests will once again cradle new life.
This too shall pass.
by Steve Gray
Some Memories are Gold and Green
Some memories are gold and green, others seeped in grey.
We moved around a lot when we were young. Just when one place started feeling familiar, it was time to move again. Some places never felt like home.
I miss the house with the great oak out front. Everyone was happy there. But like all the others, it soon fell into memory.
The house on the corner was always cold. I think it’s because my parents didn’t hug any more. I remember dull and lonely school days, nights of half-warm leftovers, and lights out at seven. No laughter, no love, no sounds, just people avoiding each other.
Winter came and was a comfort, because the sky looked how I felt. It rarely rained, that would be too much of a relief, and the world was bathed in ominous, dour grey for months on end.
The winter departed, but the trees never regained their leaves. I still don’t know why. For a time, their twisted limbs bore tangled nests, though I never saw any birds. I might have held hope that they escaped, but it seemed more like they never really arrived. A little like me.
I know there were good times in that house on the corner, but all I remember is the cold, gathering dark of nightfall, the flickers of companionship overshadowed by the constant tension.
I live in green and blue places now, where the sun’s gold heat warms my skin, but I still feel the kiss of sadness. I think we all do.
All the colours come and go, but the grey remains evermore.
And there’s comfort in that.
by Jesse Harman
Nests
They filed from their humble stone cottages across the lane to the cemetery. The men carried their Pastor’s body on a rough wooden form borrowed from the blacksmith shop. Hats in hand they gathered around a fresh grave. Fred Elmore, Pastor Krumnow’s long-serving secretary, had been elected to deliver their leader to the next world. He stood, mutton chop whiskers resplendent, ready to read from the commune’s Bible.
It was 1880, almost 30 years since Pastor Krumnow led them from Geelong to establish their dream, a Christian Socialist commune at the foot of Mt. Rouse near Penshurst.
Across the lane, back in their little settlement, crows cawed ceaselessly from their nests, as if mourning Krumnow’s death. In the failing light of an autumn afternoon Pastor Johann Krumnow was laid to rest in the rich volcanic soil of Western Victoria. A cold easterly wind nipped at their faces.
Elmore, an Anglican by birth in far-off England, straightened his body above the shrouded form and began to deliver the funeral service.
“Today I read from Isaiah 65:17, ‘For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind.'”
“Pastor Krumnow came to us from Germany and led us here thirty years ago to set up a new order. His vision is with us yet, tho’ he is not. We honour him for all the good and kind things he did, we forgive all else.”
A voice wracked with emotion, a woman’s voice, interrupted Elmore.
“He was a monster. I hated him. I will never forgive him, never!”
Members of the congregation crossed themselves.
The crows fell silent.
by John Margetts
Nests
As I walked past the town, long dark branches loomed over me like death. How frightened I was! It was considered childish to be scared of a town due to rumours regarding the Messenger of Death. What else could I do? The illiterate children of my school had blackmailed me. They had said they would cease bullying my little sister if I would complete this small task. This small task was nothing compared to how much it would help my sister.
As the sun slowly kisses the horizon goodbye knowing they will soon meet again, darkness engulfs the sky, swallowing it whole, leaving an endless, dark expanse only illuminated by a mesmerising circle. I squint my eyes, making out the trees at the end of the town. At the top of the boughs, small bundles sit on the tip, balancing for the sake of their lives. At first, I thought they were bundles of fabric. However, as I near the tree, they seem to be neatly packed bundles of twigs. How curious! How do they balance on the branches? Why are they up there? Countless questions bombard my mind as I observe the bundles.
As two birds glide on to the bundle, perching on it effortlessly, I understand what it is. It’s the home of the birds. Sweet chirps fill my ears as little chicks tweet excitedly at the appearance of their parents.
Young birds.
How sweet.
by Saakhi B
Two’s Company
Billy Bunting liked climbing trees, though ‘liked’ is perhaps not entirely correct to say. ‘Needed to’ might be a better description. A large mango tree in his backyard had become his private refuge whenever the arguing at home got too loud.
Freckle-faced Billy would climb up high into the tree’s branches and nestle hidden from everyone. Alone with his thoughts and just the occasional fruit fly or aphid for company, he was able to survey the neighbourhood like a sailor atop of a lookout mast.
After another quarrel between his parents one afternoon – something about his father not loading the dishwasher properly – high up amongst the tree limbs, Billy noticed something odd. A neatly carved notch, which he swore was not there the previous day, had been etched into one of the main canopy branches he used as his resting seat. Someone else was using his beloved escape tree!
Over the next month he noted more and more notches carved into the same high branch. Billy set his mind to finding out who the mystery person was who was using his tree. He commenced a surveillance schedule from his bedroom window, which had a clear view of the backyard and his hideout tree.
Uneventful weeks passed with no breakthrough until early one clear Sunday morning. Still wiping sleep from his eyes, Billy was sure he’d awoken to glimpse a pair of human legs scrambling up the trunk of the tree.
Dressed in his pyjamas, he raced down into the backyard and approached the base of the mango tree. Looking up, whoever or whatever may have crawled up there was concealed by the thick branches and dense greenery of the leaves.
“Who’s there?” he called up. A moment of silence passed and then… a familiar voice, “Come on up son.”
by Glen Donaldson
The Ashes of Home
Desolate.
That was the only word that I could use to describe the weathered village in front of me. The bricks looked like they were about to crumble, the trees stripped bare of leaves. One thing was certain. There was no one here. All the villagers had moved to the city, just across the lake from this ruin.
But there was another word that described this place.
Home.
I lived here all my life. I grew up in the streets, playing with my friends. Until the government intervened. They forcefully took the land, stripping it for agriculture. Native wildlife had fled. Only this small section remained, a ghost of the prospering village that once stood.
But not anymore, I reminded myself. For even I was forced to move to the city, away from my home. They took everything from me. My house, my village, my family.
Brushing back tears, I knelt down and picked up a small metal chain. A locket. Something so simple, but with such a rich and tragic past. They say that the locket is bad luck, since tragedy and bad luck befell any who wore it. Bad luck certainly came to the village. I slipped the chain into my sleeve pocket. It couldn’t get any worse. Suddenly, my chest tightened. My fists clenched in anger. Anger at the government. Fury at myself. An insatiable rage that filled my every nerve.
And a new word popped into my head. A word that represented my hopes, my future. A word for both justice and sin. A word that perfectly described what I was about to do.
Revenge.
by Aditya K.
You are invited to join the Geelong Writers Ekphrastic Experience!
The Geelong Writers Ekphrastic Challenge #3, Professor Lewis (photo courtesy of SLV) for April 2025 is now open (closing on Sunday 27 April). You may view the full invitation here.
Jan Price
Sorry – not sure what I am required to comment on ?