Among the urban run-off removed by the Lake Merritt Institute: a cell phone, a safe, a no littering sign, a football trophy, an assault rifle, a clay mask, dentures, a television set, unmentionable clothing, a fire extinguisher, a magic wand, an armchair, numerous car parts, and drugs.

. . .

At the earliest morningtide, solar scintallas crouched behind a coil of house-flecked hills. In shadow, the lake is murky, rippling dark with dark things that swim, gleaming briefly as I pedaled past, scanning the coast for a particular bird.

The brown pelican is my favorite bird this month: pouch-jowled, mysterious, calm. I spy them, mostly alone, at the lake on warm mornings, ponderous and drowsy behind that Venetian mask of a beak. They aren�t like the other birds, and certainly not like the geese, a clannish bird and constantly asquawk, jamming traffic on Lakeshore as they parade toward lunch. Geese are glad to eat the breadcrumbs of humans; sometimes I wonder if they are similiar to pelicans, who, if fed by humans in the first year of their lives, will never migrate.

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