Cry Crow

Weeping bird seen evil, seen silver. Eyes brown seem sad. Feathers black not enough. Cry crow, the saddest things you’ve seen tear at dry curls until your scalp bleeds. Weeping thing, weeping face. So pretty, so pretty.

Ever saw a crow cry. Saw the fat tears falling raw.

Ever leaned in

To the hollow of a crow

Ever heard the girl who

Hides in the dark

In the pitch black breast of a crow

Dark enough so she can’t see the shade of her own skin.

Out of her mouth falls a pack of matches

Burns them all with her eyes shut tight so she won’t see the color of her own skin.

Smoke curling straight up

Smoke lingering sideways

Spills out the crow’s mouth

Crow, smoke filled crow. A smoke filled throat hacks and spews hatred

Out of her mouth falls a comb

Couldve been white hot the way she recoils

Covers and hides her hair in clumps in her hands, dont let her see how tangled its become -- what would she do then

Sick crow, sick with pity, chest aching with self pity

Girl can’t see the crow coughing and crying

Just beats on the walls of the cave

Don't notice her brown fists, the fists full of hair

Brittle like matches she thought it was

Uglier than the air in here, drier than the crow inside

She dragged and maimed her scalp in the dark, she can’t see

No, the crow wouldn’t swallow a hand mirror and she wasted all those matches

So how could she see how pretty she looked when the crow swallowed her whole

Hatred rolls off the tongue now, the crow feels it burning a hole in its chest she ruined everything ruined herself and killed the damn crow in the process

Right off the crow’s tongue rolls apologies wrapped in pity and burnt curls and bile anything beautiful has already been eaten by stomach acid

What did you do? What did you do crow to the girl What did you do What did she do What has she done to you What has she done to her beautiful hair?

Marley Reedy is a sophomore Anthropology major and a writer who turns her thoughts into poetry. She admires how poems make art out of words. She is increasingly interested in associative and abstract forms of poetry.