Holy cow, this photo is now my most viewed of all time, and it's only been up since Sunday night!
I mentioned then that a poem written by one of the choir members had been read about Pale Male during the service. I spoke to the author, Leila Hawken, (yes, that is her name!) this afternoon and got her permission to reprint a portion of it here (thanks to Claire A. Sanders, also in this photo for getting the text of the poem to me today). Here is an excerpt from
Strictly for the Birds For Pale Male Lola:
"... As a single bright star has guided the lowly to a manger drear,
May the story of Pale Male and Lola in our hearts remain near,
They ask nothing but a place for twigs and branches to hold
Their place by the park, without price, neither bought nor sold
The Manhattan island home of pale Male and Lola."

That night, Molly Gunther, Nina's mom, told me about another poem that I am reprinting here in its entirety. Read it, then go over to Lincoln Karim's site and buy yourself a pack of postcards or a 2005 calendar showing some of Mr. Karim's magnificent photography of Pale Male and Lola.

Evening Hawk
by Robert Penn Warren

From plane of light to plane, wings dipping through
Geometries and orchids that the sunset builds,
Out of the peak's black angularity of shadow, riding
The last tumultuous avalanche of
Light above pines and the guttural gorge,
The hawk comes.
His wing
Scythes down another day, his motion
Is that of the honed steel-edge, we hear
The crashless fall of stalks of Time.

The head of each stalk is heavy with the gold of our error.

Look! Look! he is climbing the last light
Who knows neither Time nor error, and under
Whose eye, unforgiving, the world, unforgiven, swings
Into shadow.

Long now,
The last thrush is still, the last bat
Now cruises in his sharp hieroglyphics. His wisdom
Is ancient, too, and immense. The star
Is steady, like Plato, over the mountain.

If there were no wind we might, we think, hear
The earth grind on its axis, or history
Drip in darkness like a leaking pipe in the cellar.