Today is day six (for me) of the Poetry Postcard Project. I wrote in response to a poem by Lucia Perillo titled ‘The Crows Start Demanding Royalties,’ from her collection Luck is Luck. The poem was sent to me by my Poetry Swap partner, a pen-pal activity Dustin Brookshire has created. Thanks to my new friend from the great state of Washington for sharing such an amazing poem! Lucia Perillo is the recipient of a MacArthur Genius Grant, and it shows. Her poems are witty, insightful, and way beyond my meager capabilities. But I keep trying, because writing poems is fun. Especially poems about crows.

Why the evening gown? My postcard shows a fashion model wearing a long gown, running across a city street. It’s sort of about crows, sort of about women and what they wear.

This Crow is not a Fashion Model
in response to Lucia Perillo

This crow doesn’t traipse across Manhattan streets wearing a strapless taffeta gown designed by Vera Wang, nor does she wear Manolo Blahnik stilettos. This crow sports wooden shoes painted blood red, black jeans and a sooty vest. This crow stains her feathers the color of shoe-polish and cakes it with bee’s wax to spike it in a Mohawk. This crow dances the Merengue in a circle with the others from her murder. They flap their wings in a herky-jerky manner and step on each others’ toes when they hop step to the left or the right. Such lack of grace prompts piercing screeches from the murder. This crow does not eat salads.