We stalk the banks
of swamps and slow rivers
in silence, our voices too full
of clam shells for hunting.
We blossom in violence
spring-loaded heads
striking the mud
for insects, salamanders, frogs
our feathers arsenals
of indigo knives,
necks adorned
with fishbone needles.
Yet we fly so tenderly
blooming from rocks
slow wingbeats
folding the air
toward soft chests.
For some, we are easy,
conspicuous targets
for others, kites
pulling our own
strings through sunset
nectarine eyes
in winter’s bare trees.
You often see us
alone and wonder
how we mate
but you haven’t seen
what births us—the building,
the gathering, the shared
warmth of bodies.
Alaskan coastline
campus quad fountain
we will adapt.
We don’t come seeking
attention
tracing water
with a seamstress touch
but our exits are
subtle as drag queens
dropping coins
for starving poets.
Wherever we go
the marshes may dry
and the slick-calm ponds
may grow scales of ice—
they have, for centuries
but so have we persisted.
Soon, more than this,
we will know abundance
our beaks writhing with fish.
Laura Casteel is a writer and media producer from Pittsboro, North Carolina. Her poetry has previously appeared in HOOT Review and Ultisol, and her video work has been featured in The Root, NPR Live Sessions, and PBS North Carolina. You can find some of her work at casteelvideo.com. When she’s not writing or filmmaking, she’s either quietly yearning or cuddling her guinea pigs.
This poem previously appeared in Ultisol.