Poetry

Reuters photo

By

Elizabeth Martin

Defeathered

There was a cardinal — not the bird that lands

like a candle flame at the top of black pines —

the other kind — the feeble old man

whose cloak of power swirled

around him through the years,

through the boys

he seduced with slick

words, whose flesh

he plundered with thick-

fingered lust and arrogance —

sure as a driver in a Michigan winter,

where more drivers die than anywhere,

that his car would never sail

across the roadside ravine,

flying wingless into an icy river,

the dark, cold water closing

like healing a wound

over his flailing, raging head.

Elizabeth Martin

I am a graduate of the University of Michigan and a long-time Michigan winter driver.  My poetry has appeared in ‘Next Line Please, Prompts for Poets and Writers,’ David Lehman and Angela Ball, eds., ‘The Avalon Review,’ ‘The Huron River Review,’ ‘The Bear River Review,’ ‘American Scholar,’ ‘Rat’s Ass Review,’ and others.