Kathleen McGookey

A Bird is a Prayer

Especially a bird in flight, especially a bird flying low over a green field
of meadowgrass, or clover, or wheat. That lightness and speed, that
burst of wings, that blur lilting so fast you almost miss it, that’s the
prayer. The bluebird or finch or, yes, even sparrow nearly weightless
but weighted enough with some blood and a quick dark eye skims the
mind’s surface, troubles the morning, gray and soft with oncoming
rain, soft enough to cradle the bad news each day brings. So it matters
that the bluebirds today are tireless, methodical little machines feeding
five new prayers, just fledged, lined up and nearly hidden in the boughs
of the pine.

Kathleen McGookey has published five books and four chapbooks of prose poems, most recently Paper Sky (Press 53) and Cloud Reports (Celery City Chapbooks). Her work has appeared recently in journals including Copper Nickel, Epoch, Field, Los Angeles Review, North American Review, Prairie Schooner, and The Southern Review. It has also been featured on American Life in Poetry, Poetry Daily, and SWWIM Every Day.