Free Verse Found Poem
Adding Insult to Injury
a joy to
lovers of pointing dogs is the quail
no other feathered quarry responds so well
to the setter technique of gunning
none has contributed so much
toward good fellowship among sportsmen
as the little bobwhite
the bobwhite is getting smarter too
more and more he is taking to the heavy cover
more and more he is learning to do his feeding
within running distances of brambles
so thick even a dog has trouble
threading his way through them
"Cheney
shoots at quail, hits hunting companion." Vice President
Dick Cheney accidentally shot a 78-year-old hunting
companion during a weekend quail hunting trip after the
man went to retrieve a bird and Cheney failed to spot
him.
~Susan Page, USA TODAY, February 12, 2006
Found: Thanks to
Lure of the Open edited by Joe Godfrey, Jr.
and Frank Dufrene, published in 1949 by Brown & Bigelow, St.
Paul, Minnesota. I found a first edition in a used book shop
in Moss Landing along Highway 1 on California's Central
Coast. The bobwhite is called a "quail" by northerners and a
"partridge" by southerners. The name, bobwhite, is imitative
of its mating call. I feel a special connection to this
bird. I was given the honorary name Badger Bobwhite when I
won the 2011 White Buffalo "Chief's Judge Award."
