A small moment during a work break in a library becomes a lesson in listening. A coworker plays birdcalls on his iPad, and the speaker is delighted. The sounds are compared to a startled owl, and even the speaker's dangling lanyard turns into a mouse fleeing in fear, shaking with laughter. The refrigerator joins in, groaning and clinking as it makes ice, as if it were mocking the app.
After the break, the speaker keeps hearing birds everywhere: in jingling change, in the elevator's "sing sing," in clacking keyboards. The mood is playful, warm, and a little amazed, like someone whose ears have just been tuned to a new channel.
The ending widens the idea. Fingers become flocks, and opening a book lets the reader "take flight." The poem suggests that a library, ordinary as it seems, is full of life and movement once you pay attention.