A flattened brown tabby marks the parking turnout
near the nature preserve, where morning’s breeze
animates wisps of hair across its lifeless form.
I park V Otis Walter* as a kettle of turkey vultures
considers that recently smacked down cat,
circling blackness,
red heads tilting to meet my eye.
One, two, three of them land.
Commencing this feline feast,
the largest vulture hisses,then rips
into the belly of the road killed beast.
The other two dance,
leg-to-leg,wings spread wide,
while the kettle circles.
Red heads tilting, they hiss messages
like tears through heavy fabric
swaddling the dead,
dressing them for the belly of hell.
Brenda Warren 2017
This is wonderfully told – I have a penchant for collective nouns (especially unusual ones) and a poem titled “Said the Kettle of Hawks” was published by Sixfold last summer.
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I got chills with these lines:
‘Red heads tilting, they hiss messages like tears through heavy fabric swaddling the dead’
Remarkable!
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What vivid images you make, reminds me of the Shakespearean witches gathered around their cauldron…a boiling bubble of toil and trouble.
Elizabeth
http://soulsmusic.wordpress.com
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“a kettle of turkey vultures” is fantastic. I can see them boiling about, cauldron-like.
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