"A Bristle of Wings in the Ivy"
Listen to Teresa Cader read this poem.
When the gong sounded, I was alone in the stone tower—
A bristle of wings in the ivy, dry-necked mortar in the walls.
I sat like a monk at prayer. Wind whistled through the cracks
And I heard you call me:
************Come back to your simple
************Table, your garden of burgundy lilies, that chair in the corner
************Where you can see chickadees on the feeder chased off
************By squirrels. We can give you solitude. Soup. We can bring
************The moon to you by cutting a branch from the sycamore.
************We hurt you because we are human. We couldn't
************Hear your voice in a hurricane's silence.
Then I called to you:
************You haven't wronged me. I've needed to live as I have,
************With suppose as the friend I turn to.
************I haven't loved you deeply enough. The mockingbird
************In the ivy could not steal my song otherwise.
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Teresa Cader is the author of Guests, The Paper Wasp, and History of Hurricanes (2009). She teaches poetry in the low-residency MFA program at Lesley University.
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