Barn Swallows, Returning
by M.J. Iuppa
Is it true they scatter
transparent letters across the sky?
—Pablo Neruda
Uncanny scissor-switch wings
cut an alphabet of sound echoing
against our barn’s sagging doors that
stand open a crack, letting them in . . .
Pity us, whose voices are chained in
our throats, who can’t charm doors
like these constant shadows soaring
from day to night into the next day,
making certain their colony of nests
are full of salutations that greet us
every time we cross the threshold
into a life we find difficult, but waiting
for us to begin again, and again . . .
____________________________
M.J. Iuppa lives on a small farm near the shores of Lake Ontario.
Her most recent publications are a chapbook, As the Crows Flies
(Foothills Publishing, 2008), and her second full-length collection,
Within Reach (Cherry Grove Collections, 2010). Iuppa is Writer-in-
Residence and Director of the Arts Minor Program at St. John Fisher
College in Rochester, New York.
◄ Previous page Apple Valley Review, Fall 2011 Next page ►
Is it true they scatter
transparent letters across the sky?
—Pablo Neruda
Uncanny scissor-switch wings
cut an alphabet of sound echoing
against our barn’s sagging doors that
stand open a crack, letting them in . . .
Pity us, whose voices are chained in
our throats, who can’t charm doors
like these constant shadows soaring
from day to night into the next day,
making certain their colony of nests
are full of salutations that greet us
every time we cross the threshold
into a life we find difficult, but waiting
for us to begin again, and again . . .
____________________________
M.J. Iuppa lives on a small farm near the shores of Lake Ontario.
Her most recent publications are a chapbook, As the Crows Flies
(Foothills Publishing, 2008), and her second full-length collection,
Within Reach (Cherry Grove Collections, 2010). Iuppa is Writer-in-
Residence and Director of the Arts Minor Program at St. John Fisher
College in Rochester, New York.
◄ Previous page Apple Valley Review, Fall 2011 Next page ►
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Apple Valley Review:
A Journal of Contemporary
Literature
ISSN 1931-3888
Volume 6, Number 2
(Fall 2011)
Copyright © 2011
by Leah Browning, Editor.
All future rights to material
published in the Apple
Valley Review are retained
by the individual authors
and artists.
www.applevalleyreview.com
A Journal of Contemporary
Literature
ISSN 1931-3888
Volume 6, Number 2
(Fall 2011)
Copyright © 2011
by Leah Browning, Editor.
All future rights to material
published in the Apple
Valley Review are retained
by the individual authors
and artists.
www.applevalleyreview.com
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