Crow Cento*

The way a crow shook down on me,
such an awkward dance, these gentlemen
in their spottled-black coats, how peaceable.

Crows startle the clouds with grievances
never resolved, it seems. For lonely men to see
a crow fly in the thin blue sky, picking through trash

near the corral; that fool crow, understands the center
of the world as greasy scraps of fat caught at last
in their black beaks. Crow nailed them together.

How the crow dreams of you, flying the black flag
of himself. He tried ignoring the sea, but it was bigger
than death, just as it was bigger than life.

Each of them thought far more than he uttered.

*Lines from: Ted Hughes, Judith Barrington, Robert Frost, Mary Oliver, Joy Harjo, John Clare, Vachel Lindsay

*

Duplex: Slippage

I am most at home on my own.
My heart moves in constant give and take.

         I give and take, keep more than I dish out.
         So many dishes I’ve dropped have broken.

Broken dishes dropped, cry out.
Harsh, rough edges. Bowl emptied

         into a harsh, empty world.
         When there’s no one to spread the glue,

cracks spread. Nothing holds together.
My first husband took my son away.

         My first husband took my heart away
         on the back of a Honda motorcycle.

Back and back, the growl of the bike.
I am most at home on my own.

*

Judy Kaber is the author of three chapbooks, most recently, A Pandemic Alphabet. Her poems have appeared in journals such as Pleiades, Poet Lore, Hunger Mountain, Comstock Review, and Prairie Schooner. Her poem, “Sword Swallowing Lessons,” was featured on “The Slowdown.” Judy won the 2021 and 2023 Maine Poetry Contest. She received a Maine Literary Award in 2024. Her book, Landscape With Rocks, Sky, Nails, is forthcoming from Fernwood Press in 2025. She is a past poet laureate of Belfast, Maine (2021-2023).