tidies by andrew downs ears blue lips birth spring geese chemistry electro-rationalism starlings ray academic competition hannah ball age dated breath bait godfatherly starlings Hester was staying in to make fish and finger soup for her boyfriend. "Mm. Needs more marmalade," she said, tasting it with an absinthe spoon. "If this doesn't fuel the love machine in him I'll have to try the other thing." The phone rang, but instead of answering she whe went to look out the window. Outside in the sky a huge flock of starlings were making computer-graphics shapes - a slow-motion close-up of a sneeze transformed in a second to the dream everyone has about a tiny and hungry pin with a sore throat darting about in between Henry Moore-like constipation. Down in the square, a nature-loving man was also watching the sight in awe. But he was new to nature love and was making the mistake that the birds were egrets and so higher up because egrets are bigger than starlings, and this made the extent and scale of the display even more magnificent in his mind. By chance, close by on a bench sat a woman who happened also to think the starlings were egrets. But in her mind she thought egrets were bigger than they really are and so her experience of awe was an amplification even of that of the man. Hester finally picked up the phone. It was another wrong number. © Andrew Downs