“The Magpie,” oil on canvas, by Claude Monet, 1869.
I don’t know if the blue jay
froze to death or first stunned herself
against the woodshed, then fell
onto the ice-hard snow
but there she lay,
bright blue brushstrokes
edged with black
against gleaming, solid white.
I picked up the body, slid it
out into the snowfield that none of us,
not deer, coyote, woman, fox,
could cross until melt came.
By morning, it was gone.
No tracks. Nothing broke the snow.
So I know she was taken up
by something with wings.
Hayden Saunier’s work has been published in journals such as 32 Poems, Shenandoah, Thrush, Southern Poetry Review, The Sun, and Virginia Quarterly Review, as well as featured on Poetry Daily, The Writer’s Almanac, and Verse Daily. Awards include a Pushcart Prize, the Pablo Neruda Prize, the Rattle Poetry Prize, and Gell Poetry Award. Her newest book is Wheel.
