{"id":5004,"date":"2017-07-16T13:43:22","date_gmt":"2017-07-16T13:43:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/?p=5004"},"modified":"2017-07-16T13:45:03","modified_gmt":"2017-07-16T13:45:03","slug":"rib-caged-bird-laura-coe-moore","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/?p=5004","title":{"rendered":"RIB-CAGED BIRD – Laura Coe Moore"},"content":{"rendered":"

I failed to remember
\nthe swoop and swallow
\nof wings now sweeping
\nthe bottom of the cage,
\nfluttering against the boney bars,
\nwith no explanation offered.
\n 
\nHow long does the mouth
\nhave to be open
\nto eat a degree in ornithology?
\nHow long do the eyes
\nshut out the world as
\nnew ones open inside?
\n 
\nSome might say it\u2019s
\nmy romance with flight,
\ntraining my muscle to spasm,
\na wisdom gained by pecking
\nat things, just long enough
\nbefore leaving.
\n 
\nHas it always been a part of me,
\nquietly sleeping in the dark,
\nuntil the skin was removed
\nthat covered it?
\n 
\nMost of the time it seems at rest
\nuntil of course it isn\u2019t. When
\ntrapped it panics, beating
\nmy lungs with feathers
\nthat take it nowhere.
\n 
\nIf I press my fingers hard
\non the spot where all the
\ntrouble begins, does it know
\nI\u2019m trying to let it out, or
\ntaking the pulse of a ghost?
\n 
\nI wonder if it\u2019s always been there,
\nan egg in a warm interstitial
\nspace between bone and muscle,
\nheart and lung, waiting to be born?
\n 
\nThinking it might have been
\nthere at birth offers a seed
\nof comfort. Thinking that it was not I
\nwho inhaled it from the air,
\nor gulped it down like a ravenous beast.
\n 
\nWhat would happen if flesh and bones
\nconspired to escape? Surely
\nthe screaming alone would say,
\nI am not your nest.
\n 
\n 
\nLaura Coe Moore lives on Whidbey Island in Washington and is inspired by the isolated rural nature of life. Her poetry and visual art make connections between the individual human interior and the wild external world. Her work has recently appeared in Blast Furnace<\/em> and she currently has work in The Coe Review<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I failed to remember the swoop and swallow of wings now sweeping the bottom of the cage, fluttering against the boney bars, with no explanation offered.   How long does the mouth have to be open to eat a degree in ornithology? How long do the eyes shut out the world as new ones open [&hellip<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1569,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[262],"class_list":["post-5004","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry","tag-art-balchanalex-by-salvador-dali"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5004"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5004\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5027,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5004\/revisions\/5027"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1569"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/narrativenortheast.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}