Lisa Marie Oliver
Maybe the Crows
At the coast we make
a picnic
on a blanket
looking over the ocean
then walk the dunes
before returning for lunch
to find crows
stealing food, a sunchip
in a sharp beak flying west.
All weekend we laugh about it,
running joke:
maybe the crows took it.
Missing pendant,
maybe the crows.
Salt in the freezer, maybe the crows.
Lost blue sock,
maybe the crows took it.
Maybe the crows,
a tired worn toddler,
head resting on my clavicle.
Maybe the crows,
viewpoint: dark cliffs,
bright waters.
Maybe the crows
that one Spring,
I couldn’t move
from the couch.
I watched
the poplar
out my window
week after week
until the crows arrived
to heft
and balance
each pencil-thin twig.
Picky builders,
their nests
made of a hundred
such twigs,
sidewalk
scattered
with the dropped, discarded.
Until one day they were done
and gone
and so was my
long wound
and by summer
I could see
the new adolescents
hopping from branch
to branch.
a picnic
on a blanket
looking over the ocean
then walk the dunes
before returning for lunch
to find crows
stealing food, a sunchip
in a sharp beak flying west.
All weekend we laugh about it,
running joke:
maybe the crows took it.
Missing pendant,
maybe the crows.
Salt in the freezer, maybe the crows.
Lost blue sock,
maybe the crows took it.
Maybe the crows,
a tired worn toddler,
head resting on my clavicle.
Maybe the crows,
viewpoint: dark cliffs,
bright waters.
Maybe the crows
that one Spring,
I couldn’t move
from the couch.
I watched
the poplar
out my window
week after week
until the crows arrived
to heft
and balance
each pencil-thin twig.
Picky builders,
their nests
made of a hundred
such twigs,
sidewalk
scattered
with the dropped, discarded.
Until one day they were done
and gone
and so was my
long wound
and by summer
I could see
the new adolescents
hopping from branch
to branch.
Biography
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Lisa Marie Oliver (she, her) is a queer Filipina-American poet. Her poems are featured or forthcoming in Book of Matches, Windfall, FERAL, and Literary Mama. She recently completed ARIM, An Artist Residency in Motherhood and is a passionate gardener in her spare time. She lives in Portland, Oregon with her wife and toddler.
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