Poetry
The Last Parakeet
Sold
to the zoological garden
she will never know
why a colorful hat decoration
trumped her right to live.
Brilliant little green and yellow child
with a red mask and white beak,
the hour of her death was unnoticed
and unnoted, pile of stray feathers
in a lonely cage.
She is
as we are, wisps of smoke,
fallen, remote, brilliant for awhile then gone,
disappeared into stars,
extinct.
By Susan April
forthcoming, in Elk River Writers Workshop 10th Anniversary Anthology, Spring 2025.
NEW “Drift”
“This poem was sourced from the classic science textbook Hitchcock’s Elementary Geology, a text used by both Henry David Thoreau and Emily Dickinson. My process involved a close reading of Section I, “A General Account of the Constitution and Structure of the Earth and of the Principles on Which Rocks are Classified,” and Section III, “Lithological Characters of the Stratified Rocks.” I made lists of key phrases and was struck by the sensual language that at times recalled a love letter or a forlorn postcard. “Drift” was created from such lifted phrases with linking words of my own.”
See “Drift” at Heron Tree an online poetry journal.
Susan reading “Drift” and other poems at Sky Stage in Frederick Maryland - May 9, 2023
Poems Published
More Poems
Adanna Literary Journal: Mothering in a Pandemic: “Dear Quinn”
Albatross: “Oklahoma”
A Tether to This World: Stories and Poems About Recovery, “Truth Be Told” (“Priscilla Marie”)
Beat Scene, “End of Track”
Blink Ink, “With Jack at the Paradise Diner,” “Whose There?” “Cupples Square Diner"
French Class: French Canadian-American Writings on Identity, Culture, and Place:
“A Little Family History,”
“How to Grow Roses,”
“La Survivance,”
“Laying to Rest,”
“Street French.”
Heliotrope: French Heritage Women Create: “Fouilleuse”
Literary Lowell: The Richard Howe blog: “End of Track”
Medical Literary Messenger: An Artistic Voice for the Healing Arts: “Into the ER, We Rush”
Merrimack: A Poetry Anthology: “La Survivance,” “A Little Family History”
Mid/South Sonnets: “Fatality #9"
Nuclear Impact: Broken Atoms in Our Hands: An Anthology of Poetry: “this happened”
Sing Heavenly Muse!: “What I Do For A Living”
The 11th Muse: “In My Wallet, A Warm Stone”
The Iowa Source, “Water Witching”
Tiny Seed Literary Journal: “Club Moss”
Visions: A Journal of International Poetry: “Egress”