Ekphrastic Challenge #7, August, Wedge Tail

Responses to the August Challenge:

We invited everyone – members and non-members alike – to use this image, ‘Wedge tail’ (photo by David Bridge), to inspire an original response in 300 words or less.

 

We present the contributions of 21 writers who have provided flights of fancy and acute observations for the August 2025 Geelong Writers Ekphrastic Challenge Wedge Tail.

Congratulations to:

Fran O’Mara    Allan Barden    Mary Szymanski   Gail Griffin

Ian Stewart     Julie Edmonds    Steve Gray    Geoff Gaskill

Hilary Guest     Russell Abbott    Denise Main    Adam Stone

Howard Osborne   Glenyse Robins-Ward    Jan Price   

Scott Hunt    John Margetts    Ian Chisholm

David Bridge     Dulara J.    Bev Blaskett

 

Forrest to Lorne drive with wedge-tail vision

Past Otway’s forest sedge our car crawls the canopied road.

Our aged conversation now banally hesitant and dispersed

compared to young encyclopedic talks through nights

stretching life’s boundaried beliefs while words and wine flowed

before soul connection shattered by actions I could not reverse

and you hunkered into self, irrationally phobic of my plight.

As hobbled words trickle away lives’ minutiae with trivial non-concern

and car rounds Benwerrin Track towards Frog Pond Billabong,

Right There, medial to our line of sight, the monumental wedge-tail

grounded between ash, blue gum, wattle and fringed mountain ferns.

Jarred by car creep the eagle unfurls its wings in rapid steps along

the track stunning us to silence, our failed talk’s perfect countervail.

Our eyes trace in unison its hovering glide, neither walk nor flight,

wing feather fingers dappled in the treed tunnel of our drive.

Fearless before our gaze it lifts transformed in billabong sky,

a draft of shadowed eagle emblazed by sun’s light.

Our hearts’ groaning annealed, languishing loves revive

to stitch our separate stilted speech into sole splicing of familial ties.

To see and know the summed years of our suffered illusions

disappear in the wing-flap and uplift of umber-glistening Bunjil

stirring fresh breath through our clagged, clayey lives.

To be again one, each with each, cleansed of confusions

double decades of agonised solitude sluiced away in eagle

flight this life-reviving Forrest to Lorne Otway drive.

              • Fran O’Mara

 Empty nesting

The house still carried the echoes of Marianne’s children’s footsteps, their slammed doors, their shouted “Mum!” across the house. She had raised them to be strong, to take flight, but hadn’t anticipated the space they would leave behind.

Cup of tea in hand, Marianne spent reflective hours on her deck, staring out across the Dandenong Ranges. This is where she first noticed the eagle. Just a speck, but it grew larger as it approached, a wedge-tailed eagle riding the thermals. She soon discovered that on most days, if she waited long enough, she would see them, the first eagle she’d noticed, now with another.

Marianne drew parallels with the eagles and her own life. The building of a nest, the raising of young, and the inevitable moment when they must fly. She remembered her own years of ‘nest building’, painting bedrooms, sewing curtains, endless school runs.

One night a fierce storm lashed the Dandenongs – heavy rain, howling wind. Marianne worried about the eagle’s nest as if it were her own. Next morning, she scanned the hills, worried.

For a while nothing, then she saw them. They circled over the far hills as if nothing had happened at all. She saw a smaller eagle with the pair, learning to fly. Its movements were clumsy, but the parents kept near. Marianne realised she was seeing a fledgling, testing the sky.

As the fledgling grew stronger it often soared ahead of its parents, almost out of sight. Marianne thought of her children, chasing their own thermals. Like the eagles, her nest had done its work.

Marianne still watches the eagles, but now she also notices the smaller birds, the clouds, the trees, the scent of new garden growth. She’s realised that an empty nest is not an end, but a change of season.

              • Allan Barden

Eagle Eye                                                     

My father had an eagle eye.

Could spot a fire, could spot a lie.

His gaze alert to heat and rain

but never spoke of inner pain.

My father had no time for fools.

He always lived within the rules.

of decency, religious law.

A policy of open door.

He’d stand and watch the wedge tails rise

to lofty heights in cloudless skies.

The stoic eagles glimpsed his stares.

His eyes so similar to theirs.

My father rarely spoke of war

though years long gone, the vision raw.

His comfort found in digging soil

and planting trees and being loyal.

My father’s memories remained

locked up inside and bound by chains.

No open door to echoes past

He eyed the future, held it fast.

Mary Szymanski

Wedge-tailed eagle raptors

Magnificent, majestic masters of their domains

Soaring at dizzying heights above their territories

Plunging hundreds of metres down to snatch their prey

Recovering their original height effortlessly

Outstretching their folded wings skilfully, then

Catching an upsurge of air, diving and sky riding

Returning to their eyries way up high.

Their mates awaiting, in nests made from sticks, leaves, branches

Measuring up to two metres in diameter and three metres deep

Raising one or two white, downy chicks each year

Maturing juveniles changing to reddish-brown colour

Flapping and lifting practice over eight months

Weaning themselves away from their parents

Leaving them eventually to claim their own territories

Large, looping, lethal talons puncture vulnerable prey

Hunting down rabbits, foxes, possums, lizards, feral mammals

Feeding on decaying roadkill carcasses and carrion

Supporting bush and farm hygiene and benefits

Alerting environmentalists to harmful chemicals and

Poisoning, by eating animals, dead from pesticides and baits

Providing early warnings for impacts of climate change

Resilient, resistant raptors inhabiting our continent

Repelling human efforts to destroy them

Rebounding in numbers exceeding pre-colonisation

Becoming recognised as the largest eagle in the world

Bearing the largest wingspan ever verified

Deserving of their place as emblem of the Northern Territory

Honouring their splendour and spectacular grandeur

                  • Gail Griffin

 

Bird of prey

The tow’ring Eagle next doth boldly soar,

As if the thunder in his claws he bore;

He’s worthy Jove since he, a bird, supplies

The heaven with sacred bolts, and arms the skies.

Marcus Manilius

Thus speaks the Roman poet, invoking the eagle’s role as the God Jupiter’s bearer of lightning. Imagine our own eagle.

Aquila audax

 

Speck

In the sky

A sudden swoop

A wide shadow forms

An unsuspecting rabbit

Meal for offspring

Prey taken

Aquila

Rises on black wings

Spread broadly

Homeward bound

Noisy chicks, clamouring for what is brought

The sad beast, torn apart, becomes the meal

Later

Wing-beat

Carries Aquila aloft

Into updraft, height reached

To and fro at wind’s whim

Drifting, soaring, gliding

Sharp eyes see roadkill

Dives

Dives

Drops onto smashed beast

Begins a well-deserved repast

A rumble

Vehicle approaching

Sound observed

Our bird begins ascent

Slowly

Slowly

Strong wing-beat

Rises to a safe height

Above the coming truck

Driver brakes

Stops

Dead beast

Dragged to roadside

Out of harm’s way

                • Ian Stewart

 

Vantage points

 

Perched atop Sillers Lookout. Arkaroola S.A.

630 meters above the ground. 360degree views. A breath of breeze.

The vantage point of eagles.

This land feels ancient. It is ancient. The Adnyamathanha people, the first inhabitants of this land, utilise their vantage point of knowledge and understanding to educate about and advocate for its protection.

I feel myself expanding into the expanse before us. And consider my non-disputed right to city habitation—the vantage point of Western civilisation. I contemplate spending a lifetime striving to justify and protect my existence, place of origin, and culture. It’s hard to imagine.

There are no signs of Western civilisation here. Except for us, the minibus and our cameras. We are specks.

The self-importance of our lives seems ridiculous.

I’ve heard people say …There’s nothing to see in the desert. It’s boring.

From my vantage points. Coastal. City. Rural. I expected the desert to bore me, too. But driving across this continent and through its centre—vantage points of experience changed that. Its vastness soothes. You can see what’s coming—time to prepare. I love the desert. It feels like the real Australia. Many cling to our continent’s edges without knowing its heart.

 

The vantage point of ageing pricks ignored realisations. Indigenous people once lived on the land my grandparents cleared and farmed. Paddocks; I’d trodden in ignorance. Not ready to acknowledge this fact, until recently, when two lines from a text by a British author jolted me awake. The paddocks haven’t always been green pastures. Or the hill cleared of trees.

Vantage points of acceptance

and acknowledgement of the first inhabitants of this land, where forests once grew, where eagles still soar.

And the stars I’d gazed—vantage point paddock—

had guided those first people.

Challenge: navigating all vantage points empathetically.

Respectfully.

 

          • Julie Edmonds

The wedge-tailed shadow

A blackened silhouette cuts through the sky,
wings wide as grief, casting doubt on the earth below.
The wedge-tailed eagle hovers, patient,
its gaze a needle threading pain into prey.

It knows death’s language by heart—
each tremor in the grass,
each heartbeat breaking like brittle glass
becomes a promise.

The world beneath it writhes with worry,
mice and hares driven mad by its silence,
harassed by the spectre overhead.
It does not rush; torment is its ally,
beguilement its craft.

Muscles coil with iron rigour,
talons sharpened by a thousand winters.
A flicker, a strike—
the sky drops a blade.

The meal is warm and still when the wind calms,
life devoured with methodical focus.
Blood streaks its beak like war paint,
a mark of all that succumbs.

Even as the bones crack,
the eagle’s eye does not soften.
It surveys the vast expanse,
ever watchful, ever hungry.

To watch it is to feel small,
a fleeting heartbeat beneath
a black sun.
Death wears feathers and sails high,
and it never, ever blinks.

              • Steve Gray

 

Tiny

They called him Tiny. Not that he was small but, on that first day when they rescued him and stuffed into a sack, he looked anything but majestic.

A voice called him, ‘A runt.’ Not that Tiny understood as he was spirited away in the stifling darkness to … somewhere else.

Tiny survived the holocaust that took his brothers and sisters. They found themselves on the wrong end of farmers’ shotguns before being crucified on barbed wire fences. ‘That’ll teach them,’ the farmers said as if the sight of bloodied carcases would deter other raptors threatening their mobs of sheep. ‘They’re pests. Vermin,’ they added as they calculated the bounty on each of the corpses. Not that Tiny would ever know their fate or could enter a dialogue with farmers about doing what came naturally.

Tiny’s fate still involved shotgun pellets. They might have brought him down but instead of dying he was scooped up, stuffed into a sack and spirited away to the local wildlife sanctuary.

‘Do gooders,’ the farmers railed at Tiny’s rescuers. ‘The only good one of those,’ they said pointing the warm shotgun barrels at the sack in which Tiny twitched and flapped uselessly, ‘is a dead one.’

Today Tiny sits on his log perch, lord of his world. His piercing eyes each day glare at the madding crowds who daily shuffle through his world below.

His wings seem as good as new, but they’re more decorative than functional. Soaring above clouds or hilly peaks is a distant memory. The best he can do is flutter down to greet his handlers, step out on their outstretched arms and take the morsels offered from their gloved fingers. Three shows a day, every day.

          • Geoff Gaskill

Power

 

I soar

I see

ten storeys down

an ant

three fields afar

a rabbit

You cannot hide from me

I know you

I know what you want

and this I promise you

I am a chameleon for your desires

I will make you feel good

even as I destroy your world

You

have given me the power

to maim

and to kill

I

sit upon my golden throne

my nest so solid and secure

I laugh at your naivety

and gather up the spoils

                        • Hilary Guest

 

 

The wedge tail war

The bush animals gathered at a clearing to await the Wedge Tail’s arrival. He glided in and called the meeting to order.

“As you have seen, a mining company has set up camp down by the stream to explore for gas. In the past we have moved further into the bush. Not this time. We will fight back using our natural talents”

 

How can we fight them? the assembled cried.

 

“Well, you Cockatoos can make such a racket that the miners won’t be able sleep or converse without shouting.

 

Lyrebirds and Bower birds can mimic phones ringing, alarms going off, engines starting and running rough.

 

Kangaroos, Emus and Wombats can hinder work on access roads and the building of the runway, planes can’t land if you swam onto the runway in large numbers.

 

Mice, you do what you do best, breed and become a plague, invade all the buildings, contaminate the food, strip wiring on the machines and play havoc in the sleeping quarters, let no one have a night’s sleep.

 

Even you Koalas can play a part; remember the Aussie myth about drop bears in the bush, here’s your chance to change the myth into reality.

 

Now to the snakes, everyone is frightened of you; infiltrate the compound, hide in work-boots left out, climb up onto rafters, curl up under bedding and slide across workers trying to sleep. They won’t after a few visits from you.

 

Lastly, I will fly high over the site and direct you as needed. Good luck. Do not forget – most of you are a protected species.”

 

It only took a few weeks for the Wedge Tail to see from his station above that the mining camp was deserted and to observe how the Australian bush began to claim back the land.

 

          • Russell Abbott

 

Mulga Bill and Wedgie

 

‘Eaglehawk Wildlife Rescue.’

‘Bill from Whipstick callin,’

‘Mulga Bill. How ya doin’?’

‘Tom, need help. I’ve come across a Wedgie, he’s been shot.’

Where are you?’

‘Near Beelzebub Gully on way to Flagstaff Hill.’

‘Wait for me at Flagstaff, I’ll be there ASAP.’

‘He’s a bigun Bill. We’ll need to bag, sedate and get him to the vet.’

Wordlessly, they secured and lifted the wounded Wedgie into the van. They drove slowly over the rutted, forest track to Eaglehawk.

‘Wing needs surgery, suturing and splinting,’ the vet said pragmatically. ‘I think he’ll be ok.’

‘Glad to hear that. Wedgies are the Dja Dja Wurrung’s totem and our Spirit Creator Bunjill.’

‘Understood Bill. I’ll do my best to put this beautiful creature to rights. Come tomorrow and visit him.’

‘Yeah, I’ll do that.’

‘How ’ya doin’ Wedgie? Ya sure look different from yesterday, all cleaned up and bandaged.’

 The eagle fixed his magnificent golden eyes on Bill. Their eyes locked.

  Bill passed a morsel treat through the wire and whispered, ‘my hero, your eyes speak of courage, strength and connection to the spirit world to which we belong. I will see you are returned to the skies.’

‘Bill, come and do the daily dressings and when ok, take him home to recover.

‘Good, I’ll strengthen my aviary for him.’

Wedgie, a little off balance, stepped warily into the aviary. Bill regularly tended the wound. It healed well.

Dawn’s splash of colours heralded the day of release. Bill, on his haunches, gazed into Wegie’s eyes and whispered a prayer.

‘My sacred totem, may the Spirit Creator be with you as you fly free again.’

Tom, Mulga Bill and the Vet stood silently as Wedgie tentatively stretched his wings. Awe-inspired, they watched him soar confidently into the morning’s blaze.

              • Denise Main

Rise Above

 

Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’

Into the future

Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’

Into the future

I want to fly like an eagle

To the sea

Fly like an eagle

Let my spirit carry me

I want to fly like an eagle

‘Til I’m free

Oh, Lord, through the revolution

Rise above

Wings aloft

Have a look around you

And count the cost

We have the power

To make a change

To seize the order

And rearrange

I want to fly like an eagle

To the sea

Fly like an eagle

Let my spirit carry me

I want to fly like an eagle

‘Til I’m free

Fly through the revolution

 

Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’

Into the future

Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’

Into the future

Fly through the revolution

There’s a solution

          • Adam Stone

(Lyrics in italics from the song, ‘Fly Like an Eagle’ – Steve Miller Band, 1976)

A keen eye

The focus is on a target even over a mile away

It is an eagle, so similar to an aimed sniper rifle

They soar above and study, to minimise failure

Wedge Tails seen in the skies all over Australia

Their gorging on roadkill can be quite an eyeful

A wingspan that can carry up to five kilos prey

Such as dingo or wallaby and everything smaller

Even a large animal is at risk in an attacking dive

Yet albeit a flying raptor, still it demands respect

Always something that its prey would not expect

Their defensive moves mean they try to survive

Even if rearing up on hind legs, to appear taller

Perhaps not best classified as a feathered friend

Yet a magnificent specimen, as many will know

Paired for life, with their populations increasing

Yet our respect for the species seems unceasing

As extinction risk is now officially classed as low

There’ll always be some accounting, in the end

                • Howard Osborne

 

Wishing You Were Here

Michael, the wedge-tailed eagle, had flown into the area from his usual resting place and found the tallest tree out in the open of the extremely large paddock on the property of the Cooper family. He had perched on that tree many times before, but this time it was different; he had a special mission that was about to occur.

Every year, he would dream about meeting his soul mate, and every year, it hadn’t come to fruition. But this time, he was certain that it would be his year for this to happen; after all, he was not getting any younger, and the stars indicated to him that this year would be his best year for this to happen.

‘I am here, waiting.’

Where are you?’, he thought as he scowled through his darkened eyes.

‘It has been days since I have perched myself here waiting for you.’

‘Why haven’t you come to visit me, as you promised some weeks ago?’

‘Each time I turned my head, I expected to I will see you, and now I can’t wait any longer for you to come.’

‘I see far in the distance that night is about to ascend, and a dash of smoke further on from the chimney that has been lit to keep the family warm, as tonight is going to be a colder night than the nights gone by.’

‘The nights that I have been cold, yet I still wait for you.’

‘I am here waiting for you. Why haven’t you come?’

‘Have you lost your way or something else?’

‘Did you ever intend to come, or was it just a dream?’

        • Glenyse Robins-Ward

 

Wedge Tail

I closed my eyes

and I was you!

Queen of the sky

flap-flapping over

the clothesline

lifting up over

the back fence

just missing

the neighbour’s

horse dodging

a sparrow

then a canopy

gumtree belly tickle.

I now

spread wide

my strong wings

and staring

straight ahead

I increase my speed

and fly right into

an oncoming storm!

The alarm clock rings!

                        • © Jan Price

 

Flying

Family meant everything to him. Everything he did, he did for them. He lived for them. He’d die for them. Providing for his family is what he was on this earth for.

For them he endured his meaningless job. For them he listened to the endless work place gossip, the idle chatter. For them he endured the fake tans, the nuclear white teeth.

Most nights he dreamt he was an eagle; soaring, scanning the plains for food. Zeroing in on his next kill. Tonight, a rabbit. Enough for the family for days.

In the morning he’d wake, disappointed. Yearning to be back in the dream; flying again.

Each evening he’d sit at dinner. Waiting to hear of his kids’ achievements; their hopes, their dreams. Instead, he heard about the latest Tik-Tok craze and how Mary-Ann Mathers just bought a new EV.

He didn’t mind. He was lucky. Family meant everything.

On weekends he would drive out to the flood plains at Connewarre and sit in his car, watching for the wedge-tails. Their magnificence was mesmerising. He envied the simplicity of their lives. He envied their strength and power. He envied their ability to control their own destiny. Above all, he envied the way they carved the sky.

Each night brought hope of another dream of flying: The feeling of freedom as the warm summer draughts lifted him, carrying him across golden plains.

But in the end, it wasn’t enough just to dream.

When they left, the dreams left with them. He didn’t blame them. He understood. They needed more than dreams.

In time he stopped driving out to the plains to watch for the wedge-tails. In time he came to understand that there is more to life than hope and dreams.

And there are many ways to fly.

 

– Scott Hunt  

 

Bunjil the eagle

Miriam caressed her belly. The child was kicking again, vigorous just like his father. She smiled. Craig was away droving, due back soon. She smiled again. Any day now she promised herself. She hoped for a boy. He would inherit her dusky skin tones but keep his father’s alert blue eyes. Her mother was an elder of the Kulin nation. Miriam wondered what she would make of her first grandchild. Her mother would make it right, make a place for the child among his own.  She glanced out the window. Sure enough, the wedge tail eagle was back, roosting high above in an old gum tree.  Bunjil was their totem, coming every day since Craig left, watching over them. She felt safe.

A fierce cramp gripped her belly, then another. It had begun. Miriam realised her baby was coming. Fresh sheets were on their bed, water boiling on the stove. Hours later, alone, she cut the cord, placed her son on her breast, then later disposed of the afterbirth in the manner of her people. The little boy sucked greedily, yawned and slept.

When Miriam woke next morning, she fed her son and carefully carried him outside. The afterbirth was gone. Bunjil too was missing. She felt her son had been accepted, blessed by the Creator.

Craig returned home the next afternoon.

– John Margetts

 

Like an eagle

The old man scrunched along the path to his usual seat by the lake’s edge. Ducks glided among the reeds nearby; an earnest conversation came from the canopy above.  Garnished by the sun’s rays, he sighed deeply, closed his eyes, his mind went free.

A high-pitched whine eased into his fuzzy consciousness. Like a searching bee, it buzzed loudly, persistently. He opened his eyes. A flinty fragment of light flashed across his vision, a shape soared upwards in the sky, the shrill sound faded, then changed pitch. The sleek shape rolled gracefully through space, arched its back and screamed towards the lake’s surface.

He noticed a casually dressed young man wearing a faded khaki hat standing nearby. He appeared to direct the movements of the sleekly efficient machine with a small handheld black box.

The old man’s eyes looked upwards again to the sleek shape as it revved, rose and rolled. Its wings glinted momentarily. Suddenly, from high above, with silent speed, a beautiful wedgetail eagle dived to attack the cocky young intruder as it completed a graceful roll.

Still caught in the moment of this amazing spectacle, the old man gasped when the eagle broke away, soared on powerful wings, then with fluid grace and a slow certainty, hovered, then again dived towards its prey. Simultaneously, the model plane rolled, climbed, banked and with a flash of wings, dived headlong towards the eagle. He held his breath as it flashed past and turned back. Suddenly, the plane banked right and swooped down, to land beside the young man. The eagle hovered, wagged its wings and gracefully drifted away, victorious.

As the young man walked past, the old man said, ‘Thanks for the flying display. I’m pleased the eagle won.’

‘So am I, he replied.’

        • Ian Chisholm

Through the Mesh

Frank enjoyed their visits to the wildlife park: it was an opportunity to indulge his passion for photography but, more so, it meant an escape from the confines of the home. The large aviary was a favourite, housing the wedge-tail eagle that perched on a tree branch high in the mesh enclosure. Despite the injury that had robbed it of distance flight, the bird’s profile spoke to the power of its species, particularly the hooked beak and talons.

A black eye stared down keeping Frank in sight but with no show of anxiety despite the aim of the lens. Opening the aperture to blur the mesh background, Frank pressed the shutter as the creature launched itself across the space towards another branch, spreading its distinctive tail like a rudder to complete its landing. Frank envied the eagle’s agility despite the enforced confinement that restricted the scope of its movements.

Reviewing his shot, Frank noted the blur on the image and upped the shutter speed hoping the bird would take flight again. He knew he couldn’t hog the viewing slot much longer. No doubt the park fed its inmates on a timetable limiting the urgency to locate prey, but exhilaration clearly outweighed laziness as the eagle launched once more. With one wing beat it was back where it started but Frank had the image he wanted.

‘Come on Frank, give someone else a go.’ A group of his fellows was clustered behind him and he dropped his camera into the bag on his lap and propelled himself forward.

‘Poor bastard must get fed up doing nothing all day.’

‘Are you talking about Frank or the eagle?’

‘Frank, of course. Always finding excuses to park that wheelchair.’

Frank laughed and gripped his wheel rims. ‘Last one to the park café buys!’

 

          • David Bridge

 

 

Heaven’s Avenger

The wind keens

a woefully poor imitation

Of that glorious angel,

which flies so high above

brown as the deepest earth

creamy-beaked with a cruel black tip,

Heaven’s Avenger

Claws,

Sharp as those from the

hooked hands

of demons toiling away

In the Underworld

Fierce as the three Furies

Watching with

The stern eye of Zeus

Heaven’s Avenger,

That’s what they call him

Not by his mortal name,

No, never something

so shrewdly

scientific like Aquila Audax

never in comparison to

His brethren,

His kin,

but only as Heaven’s Avenger

For this is no ordinary ‘bird’;

No, this swooping scourge flies

a dark smear against

the ochre expanse

and shrieks upon sighting of sinful deeds

talons tearing flesh to sinewy ribbons

rotten with tainted soul

carrion it devours,

red rivulets on red earth;

reeking of metal

And,

beak bloodied with gore

and a mighty push,

It ascends once more,

Watcher of the skies,

Heaven’s Avenger.

                • Dulara J.

At height

 

Floating, focused, patient

Taking stock

Seizing the moment

Uplift

                              • Bev Blaskett

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