Funeral in Summer

Back where the peach skin looked new,
inside the mouth of old teeth,
we buried the old bird’s bones.
We made her decorated.
We flew her back home to sleep.
Out where the sing of morning
has no voice to wake us with,
she rests in beds of missing,
her throat gone to empty sky.
We made her loud, un-thought of.
We flew her into the ground.
Buried in sugar, smooth skin,
wrapped around what we made her
into: wings and only wings.
She, shelter for the sorrow.
She, muse of wicked sunshine.
We take her to sleep, this time.
We run our sorrow into
un-hollow sparrow ground, this
time. We want for the stripped sound.
The old bird’s beak stays open.
We still try to fit inside.

By Emma Bleker

Biography:

Emma Bleker is a 21 year old writer currently working for her English degree in Virginia. She has previously been published, or is forthcoming in Electric Cereal, Persephone’s Daughters, Skylark Review, Rising Phoenix Press, and Cahoodaloodaling, among others. She probably wants to be your friend.