Sidney Wade

Bird Words

tanager
gnat-catcher

caspian tern
goat-sucker

chimney swift
canvasback

erne
bristle-thighed

curlew and
mandarin duck

fly like
the heartstrings

the stricken
and plucked

bunting
and oriole

veery
and lark

sing for
the deepest down

gold in the dark
godwit

and goldfinch
and stilt

on the fly
give me a gannet

to gladden
the eye

sora and
phalarope

phoebe
and kite

dicksissel
sapsucker

flicking
the night

magnificent
frigatebird

pinions
unfurled

the light
and the feathered

heart verbs
of the world

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Sidney Wade’s sixth collection of poems, Straits & Narrows, was published by Persea Books in April 2013. Her seventh, Bird Book, is forthcoming from Atelier26 Books in 2017. She has served as President of AWP and Secretary/Treasurer of ALTA and taught workshops in Poetry and Translation at the University of Florida’s MFA@FLA program for 23 years. Her translation with Efe Murad of selected poems of Melih Cevdet Anday won the Meral Divitci Prize and has just been published by Talisman House.