Poetry Breakfast

Another Morning

The past lies in her hand like a dead bird, feathers spread,
feet covered in dust. It frightens her, but still she holds it.

Into the sadly turned nape, she reads her own failings,
in the steely blue-black wings, her own stiff desire, the need

she has to be held. This is ridiculous! she tells herself. Mad
flies circle her hand. I’ll change this, find something better—

a coin, a forsaken toy, a wildflower. Yet this dead bird becomes
so much a part of her—her lips now a beak, the turn of her head

a bob. Her mother a woman nesting on a couch. Her father
with eyes of sharp obsidian, blustering amidst a crowd

of strangers. A trill, whirs, a sharp chirp. There’s so much
grit in the years. This morning she looked at old photos,

starchy shots, her mother with a hand on her shoulder.
The day beckons. A car passes. The present squirms

like a deer mouse, pushing its nose on her palm,
deeper in color, insistent, perhaps kinder. Morning

split with bird calls, the underside of everything revealed.

About the Poet:
Judy Kaber recently retired after 34 years of teaching. Her poems have appeared in numerous journals, both print and online, including Eclectica, Off the Coast,

The Comstock Review, and The Guardian. Contest credits include the Maine Postmark Poetry Contest, the Larry Kramer Memorial Chapbook Contest, and, most recently, second place in the 2016 Muriel Craft Bailey Poetry Contest. More of her poems can be viewed at www.judykaber.com.

Poetry Breakfast accepts submissions of poetry and poetry related creative non-fiction year-round.  See our Submission Guidelines page for details on submitting your work.

Start your morning with a nourishing poem.  Follow us on  Twitter, Facebook, and  Tumblr,  and enjoy a new poem every morning straight to your feed.

Where I Find Belief

In the arms of a spruce, a black-capped chickadee,
gray wings flat against its body.

Among twigs in the thin crown of the birch moving against
distant clouds like the fingers of the blind reading the coming storm,
through a white oak leaf flattened on the trailer’s top,
still and perfect. Under the overturned hull of the kayak
lying on leaf-littered ground, abandoned like the thick days
of summer. Tracing the dark brown

water of Wescott Stream, moving again after the dry spell.
In the turtle that crawls towards comfort

on its muddy bottom.

About the Poet:
Judy Kaber recently retired after 34 years of teaching. Her poems have appeared in numerous journals, both print and online, including Eclectica, Off the Coast,

The Comstock Review, and The Guardian. Contest credits include the Maine Postmark Poetry Contest, the Larry Kramer Memorial Chapbook Contest, and, most recently, second place in the 2016 Muriel Craft Bailey Poetry Contest. More of her poems can be viewed at www.judykaber.com.

Poetry Breakfast accepts submissions of poetry and poetry related creative non-fiction year-round.  See our Submission Guidelines page for details on submitting your work.

Start your morning with a nourishing poem.  Follow us on  Twitter, Facebook, and  Tumblr,  and enjoy a new poem every morning straight to your feed.