Grief is the Thing with Feathers

“I won’t leave until you don’t need me any more.”

Crow clearly lays out the terms of his stay with the family, although what it might mean for Dad to not need Crow any more is intentionally ambiguous. The idea of needing Crow, who is an inherently disruptive force in Dad’s life, at times even physically disruptive, seems entirely counterintuitive in the early stages of the book. With this comment, Crow also evokes the fairy tale motif that is a feature of the narrative.

“I could’ve bent him backwards over a chair and drip-fed him sour bulletins of the true one-hour dying of his wife. OTHER BIRDS WOULD HAVE, there’s no goody baddy in the kingdom. Better get cracking. I believe in the therapeutic method.”

Porter frequently uses all capitals script to simulate Crow yelling, a visual decision which gives Crow’s speech a fundamentally different shape than the speech of the other characters. Crow’s screams interject his own speech somewhat randomly, giving the impression of an erratic, uncontrollable personality.

“But I care, deeply. I find humans dull except in grief. There are very few in health, disaster, famine, atrocity, splendour or normality that interest me (interest ME!) but the motherless children do. Motherless children are pure crow. For a sentimental bird it is ripe, rich and delicious to raid such a nest.”

The metaphor of the home as a nest is one that appears throughout the book, although it shifts in meaning. Here, Crow is an invader to that nest, intent on doing violence, and his characterizations of their home as “ripe, rich, and delicious” adds a predatory element. Later, however, he will become the defender of the nest.