Eric Robert Nolan- A Poem

“Graceless Ravens Envy You,”

Revel in apostasy.
You are the black dove, hovering
High in an inklike arc.

Blacker, even, than
coal-colored wolves in onyx lines seeking
quarry at starless midnight.

More ebon, even, than
narrow sable blacksnakes staying
cravenly in shade at noon.

Darker, even, than
murders of crows, newly legion at Autumn, amassing
among saw-wing martins at dusk.

You’re blacker, even, then the rooks.
Graceless ravens envy you.

Remember your rebirth?
The sun rose,
Your birdsong changed and then
the questions flew from your beak
faster even than the wrens?
Faster than you could fly?
For a moment, they rendered
all the world obsidian.

Remember your feathers burning?
Sunlight striking your wings and then
all the slow alabaster there
singing, quickening into
aerodynamic black?
Remember the flock’s suspicion?

Remember your siblings, the nest?
Remember when
all their pearl heads turned
their backlit crowns in morning sun
ringed so thinly in shining ivory?

Their song was interrupted,
Yours was made a query —
empiricism’s aria.
Flustered, they fluttered
at all the low notes.
There were all immaculate;
you were the color of night.

Now you arc alone —
soar and sin and sing,
unrepentant one.

Somewhere an ordinary dog,
awakening from shadow,
howls at the sun.

 

(c) Eric Robert Nolan 2015

Eric Robert Nolan’s debut novel is the postapocalyptic science fiction story, “The Dogs Don’t Bark In Brooklyn Any More.”  It was published by Dagda Publishing and will be the first of a series of books entitled “The Wolf War Saga.”

Eric’s poetry and short stories have been featured by Dagda Publishing, Every Day Poets, Every Day Fiction, Illumen, Under The Bed, Dead Beats Literary Blog, Microfiction Monday Magazine, Dead Snakes, Peeking Cat Poetry Magazine, The Bright Light Cafe, Aphelion, Tales of the Zombie War, The International War Veterans’ Poetry Archive, and elsewhere.  His poems were also included in anthology format in Dagda Publishing’s “Threads” in September 2013.  Eric’s science fiction/horror short story, “At the End of the World, My Daughter Wept Metal,” was published in January 2014 in Dagda’s short story anthology, “All Hail the New Flesh.”