This is bird-note.

A torrent of shrill notes ricochets off the sheer stone walls of the Western Canyon.

A pair of white-throated swifts, kareens buy at high speed, revealing boldly patterned bodies.

They twist and turn, sailing through the air on black,

cimitar-shaped wings spanning 15 inches.

Dashing headlong across the canyon toward an unyielding wall,

the birds disappear at the last second into a slender crevice.

This swift is aptly named and doubly so.

Flying at tremendous speed, the white-throated swift is indeed swift,

among the fastest of all birds.

And its lyrical scientific name suits it perfectly,

Aeronauti's saxotalus,

sailor of the air who dwells in the rocks.

Swift's leave the air only to nest or roost in a cavity.

You'll never see one perched.

They do everything else while airborne.

Aeronautologist Percy Taviner said of them,

when mating, a pair meet high in the air,

clinging together as though embracing for a moment,

dropped down hundreds of feet,

then separate and catch themselves on their wings.

The white-throated swift is on the watch list

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