Something Else on Its Mind

Out on the bikepath for a consitutional.  It’s sports morning and minivan after SUV after crossover trail by disgorging appropriately-clad tykes.  No one walks in this town.  50 yards north of me I spot a raptor high in a tree.  It’s a sharp-shinned hawk, not a red-tail.  Haven’t seen the red-tails too much this year; not sure that’s a good sign.  Two goldfinches flit their way toward the hawk (above him and out of reach).  They’re just checking on the predator in the neighborhood and settle in the tree above him, ready to harass and distract.  Then he takes off, fast and straight to the south, crossing in front of me toward an outbuilding about 50 yards away and what I figure out in a moment is a morning dove.  The first pass misses, but he keeps on the bird which is in full-out avoid-mode.  What surprises me is that the second pass misses as well but he keeps on the chosen prey, pursuing, 10 feet behind.  Around a couple of houses and they emerge again, hunter and hunted, desperate.  Then the dove heads north in a straight line and they vanish over the trees about a quarter mile to the north.  I’ll never know what happened, or if there is an end.  This was just a chapter, unremarkable except that I saw it.  The tree in the forest.