Scent of a Feather

SCENT OF A FEATHER

I left the stray cat
secret bowls of milk
and it decided to stay,
following the scent
to my spirit house,
stalking the golden birds
who flew through my
open windows, who
stirred the air
with trees and prayer,
their wing tips dipped
in the sacred source
I yearned for.

And of course
the cat stayed, it
was such a safe place
curled up in the curve
of my marrow, its eyes
now aglow with the
colors of my soul.
If people can carry
the scent of their poems,
mine now smelled
of lingering feathers
on a feral tongue.

But I'm weary of feeding
my hollowest friend,
furring my air
with its delusions.
I pray it soon leaves,
I won't weep or grieve.
I yearn again for
the golden wings
filling my lungs with
their secrets, with
the scent of God,
with their essence of
bark and beak.

© Sherri Brannon 2014

Your head is a living forest full of song birds. ~e.e. cummings

My poems sometimes take on the scent of anxiety, which I personally have always struggled with. Do your poems have a scent?

I love that e.e. cummings describes how our head is a "forest full of song birds". And anxiety is kind of like a stray cat, don't you think? A stray cat has no home base until someone offers up a food source. That offering becomes an open invitation and it starts hanging around. And then it can't help itself...instinct kicks in and it starts preying on all the song birds in the neighborhood, those beautiful winged creatures that until now flew with a lot more fearlessness and freedom. Anxiety and fear (which I believe are the same thing) prey on our thoughts if we let them. They keep us from having faith that we can fly.

My iPhone image was edited completely with camera apps: Snapseed, Stackables, Mextures, Pictapgo, and Superimpose. The feather photo was actually taken against a black piece of cardstock, but the apps I used turned the background more colorful. The writing in the background is from an old 1800s book.

I'm linking up with Poets United today - please visit and read some great poetry!

Faith is the bird that feels the light when the dawn is still dark. ~Rabindranath Tagore