listen. we are fighting death with feathers.

We lost electricity last night

but the ceiling fan kept spinning,

propelled by savage winds

that broke our storm windows—

twisting the frames,

shattering the panes—

wrenching the

retching poor

from tattered tethers—

flagging and ravaged in pain.

The disease of death spread

‘round the house

from insistent circling blades

beyond dusting and rusting.

We attacked the pestilence

with feathers plucked from

sparrows we found quivering in the gutter.

This was the best we could do

given the amputation of the elderly,

the widowhood of the young lover
with his motherless child,

the infection of the shot soldier,

and the last lifelong labors of the home-bound sister.

the villain stole our knives,

damn him.

Our only defense,

a tremulous groan.

Our tongues suddenly stuck

inside dry mouths,

as concrete quickset inside our throat.

Our fingertips are bleeding,

too raw to write

for rubbing burlap sheets

in the blight.

Can anyone hear

what our mouths cannot say

and our hands cannot pen?

“How long?”

Why do you abdicate

when your subjects

need you to be

more than an Object?

Will you join us in our misery,

Divine Subject?

Pray do.

Stop the spinning,

calm the storm,

be our Center.

Cause these

suffocating stones

to cry out

in praise.

Hosanna.

We are wrapped in misery

and trapped in a tomb.

It is time to remove the grave clothes.

Roll the stone away.

It has been long enough.

listen. we are fighting death with feathers.

a poem by troy cady