Emptying Nest

by Bonnie Riedinger

In their dawn state
Twig legs teeter
On the cusp of flight or plummet.

Poised, but flustered
They hover above Ouroboros
Coiled dark,
Bound seven times
Around the tree base.

Barely fledged,
Already they crave–
All mouth
Unhinged
By hunger,
Inside turned nearly out
With red, wet want
They launch—
Ready to devour the world,
Heedless of the hiss
Of the future.

 

Bonnie Riedinger is a poet and fiction writer from Connecticut. Her most recent poetry publication, Aubades Were Inconceivable, is in the Southern Florida Poetry Journal.