A wonderful bird is the Pelican, Its beak can hold more than its belly ...
A wonderful bird is the Pelican, Its beak can hold more than its belly ...
A wonderful bird is the Pelican, Its beak can hold more than its belly ...
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Leaving<br />
by Olivia Bell<br />
The trees have pulsing veins,<br />
heartbeats that shiver in <strong>the</strong> ice,<br />
pounding gasping breaths;<br />
I never knew it was so loud.<br />
I am leaving.<br />
The leaves, tw<strong>is</strong>ted rags, know it.<br />
There <strong>is</strong> an anticipation, deadened by <strong>the</strong> heavy fog<br />
that almost sings.<br />
I am leaving, and <strong>the</strong> clouds know it.<br />
They batter toge<strong>the</strong>r in a frenzied war-cry<br />
and <strong>the</strong> rotten cadavers of robins and eagles circle over<br />
as if in macabre suspense for <strong>the</strong> carrion to come.<br />
No song tears from <strong>the</strong>ir scorched <strong>beak</strong>s<br />
because <strong>the</strong>y, like me, like grief and like <strong>the</strong> world<br />
have simply run out of words.<br />
The door stands half-shut in d<strong>is</strong>gust, <strong>the</strong> knocker<br />
turned away from my hand in d<strong>is</strong>grace.<br />
I am leaving, and <strong>the</strong> rusted handles share my shame.<br />
The last look back reveals something else:<br />
a shadow, swallowing <strong>the</strong> house,<br />
<strong>the</strong> clichéd swell of suffocation<br />
that shouldn’t have been a surpr<strong>is</strong>e.<br />
I am leaving, and even <strong>the</strong> sky <strong>is</strong> crying<br />
blunt, salted drops,<br />
frozen, like me.<br />
<strong>the</strong> <strong>wonderful</strong> <strong>bird</strong> Ardingly College 2010<br />
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