words of prey

[Arnold M. Zwicky]

Palo Alto Daily News, Sunday 1 February, p. 18, police blotter listings
for the city of Atherton (CA):

-----------------
   YESTERDAY

   100 block Selby Lane, 10:15 a.m.: A man suspicious-looking man [sic]
was riding around on his bike, asking for work and using "words of
prey."  Officers were unable to locate the man.
------------------

"words of prey"?  anyone have cites on this?  or insights?

a google search provides 300+ pages, almost all for the Words of Prey
message board (Women of Gotham + Canary.Noir.com -- comics fans) or for
the Sepultura song lyrics for "Arise" (1991) ("Hungry for words of
prey"), plus a few references to an Alan Malnar article on Robinson
Jeffers and to some poems and plays with this title; the expression is
an easy play on "birds of prey".

but what did the suspicious-looking man on the bicycle say?  "caw,
caw", like a raven or crow?  "want some ice cream, little girl/boy?",
like a sexual predator.  or what?

arnold (zwicky at csli.stanford.edu)