Susan Landgraf
Uncaged Song
Some days the bird in my ear sings
a song I don’t know the name of. It shuts
out the sirens, the threatening
fathers, crying children, and political rants.
Some days when the bird has flown,
I contend with fears that my children
might die before I do. I can’t shake
the ear bug boring in my brain: When the bough breaks
the cradle…. Those days I go full throttle in my car
for Satchmo, Gioachino Rossini, Billie Holiday
and Sting, my tires humming the road in concert
with the invisible singing bird.
Susan Landgraf is the author of What We Bury Changes the Ground (Tebot Bach, 2017). Her poems, essays, and articles have appeared in Prairie Schooner, Poet Lore, Margie, Nimrod, Bellingham Review, The Laurel Review, and other journals. She taught at Highline College for 27 years and at Shanghai Jiao Tong University.
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