Did I want this wisdom? One morning
in fall, the wind railed in the corn
and the crows shuddered to seize
my shoulders. I thought they were
embracing me, but their feathers
brushed my burlap cheek and scraped
the blush from my ears. Now I know
no bird loves flannel or straw unless
it’s meant for nest-making, or for hiding
from the man who tends the fields. I’ve
become too attached to my own stuffing,
when once or twice I would have given
myself gladly to any beak. Her touch
was what changed me, how she struggled
with the weight of me, worked to free
my stitched wrists from the frame
and knock mud from borrowed shoes.
And now I stand before her, wise enough
to know that my head is full of needles,
and I’m wearing another man’s clothes.
in fall, the wind railed in the corn
and the crows shuddered to seize
my shoulders. I thought they were
embracing me, but their feathers
brushed my burlap cheek and scraped
the blush from my ears. Now I know
no bird loves flannel or straw unless
it’s meant for nest-making, or for hiding
from the man who tends the fields. I’ve
become too attached to my own stuffing,
when once or twice I would have given
myself gladly to any beak. Her touch
was what changed me, how she struggled
with the weight of me, worked to free
my stitched wrists from the frame
and knock mud from borrowed shoes.
And now I stand before her, wise enough
to know that my head is full of needles,
and I’m wearing another man’s clothes.
–Morgan Adams,
In Nonestica
Accents Publishing
Morgan Adams was born and raised in a bookstore in Lexington, Kentucky and wrote her own first “book” at the age of five. She graduated from Berea College and earned her M.F.A. in poetry from Indiana University. Her work often draws upon myth, folklore, and family history.
This is a terrific poem. Those stitched wrists…
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