Christmas Guest

Announced by the squeals of the bird she killed on Christmas Eve-Eve. I was slow to investigate, she flew off before I could get a picture. When she announced her presence again on Christmas Eve (in the same fashion), I ran to get the camera and snapped off as many pictures as I could. She was right in front of me, huge and powerful - probably the biggest bird this garden has seen since before it was a garden - but on the LCD screen she was a small grainy image, digitally enlarged and half-obscured by smears on the window. She looked around as the life left the bundle of black feathers in her talons, looked right at me a few times, quizzically, and then turned and swept herself away on wide wings.