Poem by Anna Mark
Birthplace
It was the hayloft’s aerial devilry— stench of rot in the heat,
barn boards strewn with excrement, swallow and bat,
littered with too many winged corpses for a child to revive—
that compelled her
to startle the nestlings’ dormant balconies into a frenzy
of throats, ablaze at her pounding steps’ command,
to exhaust their instincts.
One thing leads naturally to another in the hayloft
and she tests the sagging boards, judges if they’ll hold
and dangles her burdened legs, weightless now, free as a bird,
soothing figure eights stirring everything
into the cauldron, the barn below, which is her way out,
where she steals a nestling and cradles its listless body,
barely alive, and she didn’t, couldn’t— can’t put it back, but
cradles the hallowed hollow where it belongs.
About the Author – Anna Mark
On the territories of the Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation, Anna’s poems appear mostly in Canadian Journals: Literary Review of Canada, CV2, Spadina Literary Review, Pinhole Poetry; forthcoming in Canadian Literature, Prairie Fire and others. She enjoys writing as a practice of transformation, and watches for those mercurial words in herself, others and the trees!
Keep Reading…
- Clarity, Drunk
Uncle Dave had come upstairs to get my dad. There was much more drinking to be had, and to be fair to Dave (not really an uncle), my dad did have a habit of falling asleep in my room while his night was still young. - The Queen of All She Surveyed
Lottie cried. She was not the one who usually cried. Evelyn was the one most often cradled in Beabea’s lap, gently rocking back and forth while Beabea stroked her back. - Poems by Thistle Dunsmuir
here is a church in Barcelona That has been under construction for a hundred years And I wonder if it is still holy In its incompletion
Meanwhile, at Dreamers…
Fireside Writing Retreat
It’s simple; a set of prompts, a loose structure, and time set aside to move through it at your own pace. You can follow it closely or not at all. There’s no expectation to produce anything finished.
Dreamers Writing Farm
Dreamers Writing Farm is the physical home of the Dreamers community, a quiet, creative space on the Bruce Peninsula in Ontario. Writers, artists, and travellers stay here throughout the year in simple, literary-themed cabins, tents, and studio suites.