You prick your finger on more

than just the needle. Hollow

cones of cartilage—white feathers

in piles at your bare feet. You string

them against each other with black

thread. Not sewing wings for flight,

no wax no Icarus. One cold witch

cauldron-bound lifted fingers

against six meddling brothers

turned birds against night sky

turned swans on lakes with no voice.

Left you on castle doorstep

plucked like early fruit

and given a gold ring. Your six

swan brothers already reached the sun

and that yellow stained their skin.

No one’s getting them back but you

and every shredded feather found

at the lake.

 

 

 

Amanda Stovicek is a writer and teaching artist from Northeast Ohio. She is preoccupied with star formation and writing that resists. Her work has appeared in Us For President, Rubbertop Review, Jenny Magazine, and is forthcoming in The New Old Stock.