Mute Swan | Teen Ink

Mute Swan

November 27, 2009
By Casey Bigler SILVER, Clarence Center, New York
Casey Bigler SILVER, Clarence Center, New York
8 articles 0 photos 0 comments

Dusk floats in o’er bogs—o’er land.
Stalks of tenuous grass fit through packed down sand.
A subtle pant of will’s last demand—
A plea so unsound, begging, “Understand!”

I part the cattails that bow in wisps,
Move the mist with daunted fists,
Force a glance and look away.
A mute swan, I fear, won’t fly today—
Won’t try today.

Her feathers clump o’er puckered skin.
A beak so blunt. A neck so thin.
A cough, a rasp, a pathetic thing.
My heart to numbness this doth bring.

Eyelids will cloaking the innocent’s pain,
But I wish her death were not in vain.
So from one grim peek, I watch again.
Her heaving breast draws one breath in.

And from behind her iris glints heaven’s slumber.
It quivers out and overcomes her.
The first and last, a screech farewell—
A similar sound to a disjointed knell.

The mist creeps forward to swathe the swamp,
And embalms the sullen shell.


The author's comments:
The Mute Swan is legend to spend its entire life in silence, crying out only once with its last breath. Otherwise known as Cygnus Olor.

Similar Articles

JOIN THE DISCUSSION

This article has 0 comments.