She Waits

I am working with an image of a great horned owl. High in her camouflaged aerie, wintry and waiting as she sits upon her eggs. I have observed her many times over the years at the old abandoned homestead in the Summer Lake Preserve. She patiently withstands the occasional birders and ATVs in order to raise her chicks in that food rich place. She is silent and powerful, a shadow of the night, perfectly colored to hide in the huge old winter-bare cottonwood tree that remains by the barn. Once I saw her fledged chicks perched in a row high on the top ridge of the barn, their fluffy feathers making them appear enormous. How they got there is a mystery to me. But then that is the thing about owls, the mystery.