Owl on the Side of the Road
|In 2015-16
|By Tulsa Review
by Pamela Chew
It is nearly noon and the sky is clear.
Like a vampire,
You are not to be out in the daylight
So I suspect the worst.
I wish that you were just sleeping
But your perfectly round head is facing me
As I drive toward the horizon.
Patterned feathers do not scatter
But defiantly remain attached
To your lifeless body on the roadside.
Your right wing and the delicate down underneath it
Rise up and gently float like a gauze veil toward your breast
With each passing vehicle.
It appears as if someone softly blows air from behind you.
Each illusory breath seems to fill your chest only to have it fall again.
Over and over,
As steady as the winter traffic
On this country two-lane.