Geraldine Connolly
To a Woodpecker
In the half dark
after a night of bad dreams
I hear you rattle the fireplace’s metal cap,
a windshield at the top of the chimney
On top of the finishing,
you hammer and broadcast
to the world that
you own this yard
and are looking for a mate.
Are you looking for treasure, or
like Slavic folklore, announcing
a death? Watching infections
multiply each day
I dream of coffins floating
one by one into the sea.
I wake and as each soul has left the world,
you sound your drumroll.
I begin to count the persistent taps
but then I hear fifty, a hundred,
a thousand, and lose count.
—Submitted on 06/22/2020
Geraldine Connolly is the author of Province of Fire (Iris Press, 1998), Aileron (Terrapin Books, 2018), and other collections. Her work has appeared in Poetry, The Gettysburg Review, SWWIM, and other journals. She has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Maryland Arts Council, the Breadloaf Writers Conference, and the Cafritz Foundation. She lives in Tucson. Online at geraldineconnolly.com.
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