My Nest Was Built With Little Bones, by Jennifer Angelina Petro

My Nest Was Built With Little Bones

By

Jennifer Angelina Petro

 

 

 

My nest was built with little bones,

Shells, feathers, twigs, candy wrappers,

Shiny things, torn pages of catechisms, shabads,

And pornographic magazines,

It was made of moss and hair, abandoned ribbons,

Scraps of red bandannas, silken scarves,

Shopping lists, and spit.

 

 

For years I incubated beneath the hollow-boned lark,

Or was it a mockingbird?

My shell survived storms

And long stretches where only monsters,

Drunken owls, and sleepy seagulls smothered me

In the night.  I learned to hide myself—

A nest within a nest—an egg within an egg;

I lived tucking parts of me away

I never wanted.  Brooding memories

Filled the nest like bits of worms regurgitated,

And every now and again I caught a glimpse of a faraway blue sky.

 

 

When the egg hatched and the nest

Bloomed, I stared blindly into myself,

Wiggling stubs of wings I so wanted covered with feathers and flight.

Yet now, I live, I walk, a nest on legs, a human egg, a permanent fledgling—

Wings clipped, song raspy with rain and darkness,

And a road of eggshells spreading out before me wherever I go.

 










Thank you for helping support my GRS and the Wonder Child Blog

 

 

 

 


 


Be Amazed, by Jennifer Angelina Petro

Be Amazed

By

Jennifer Angelina Petro

 

 

 

I am.

I woke this morning

To riotous birdsong.

As I listened, letting the staccato melodies

Sink in, I became increasingly amazed.

 

Think about it:

We are awakened

By singing.

 

Now, before you think about it too hard,

Let the truth of that statement be.

Hold it there for a few seconds,

And then go ahead and travel the winding road

Of questions and temporary answers

As to why birds sing—if you need to.

You can do that and have fun doing that.

You could also simply relish the reality—

Whatever divine randomness is out there

And in here, it chose to wake us up by singing—

By birds singing.

 

It could have chosen to wake us up

 

With construction rigging every day.

It could have chosen to wake us up

To thunderous, monotonous silence.

It could have chosen not to wake us up at all.

But it didn’t.  The divine chose to wake us up

To singing.

 

Keep that in mind–uppermost in mind

When you begin to doubt hope, beauty,

And the purpose of things,

Remember this truth

And allow yourself to be amazed.

 

Once you are good and awake

Join the chorus–let your life sing,

Everywhere you rush and run, dart and soar,

Bank and circle, glide and flutter–

May your song awaken someone–anyone

Who simply hears the song of your life—

The overarching beauty and music of who you are

And how you choose to live.

 

 


 

Thank you for your kind contributions to helping keep the Wonder Child Blog going.




Copyright Jennifer Angelina Petro of the Wonder Child Blog