Melanie Crowder (www.melaniecrowder.net) lives on the Colorado Front Range where she is a writer and educator. She teaches English to non-native-English-speaking students at her local school and holds an MFA in Writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts. Follow Melanie on Twitter at @MelanieACrowder.

clouds
 
Over the grey plain of the sea
                                    winds are gathering the storm-clouds
 
Words
float like wayward clouds
in the air
in my mind.
 
 
                                    Now his wing the wave
 
Wait—
or was it,
           
                                    Now the wave his wing caresses
 
 
I dip a hand
into my apron pocket
unfold a square of paper
against my palm,
hunch my shoulder,
hide it from view.
 
Ah,
 
yes.
 
                                    Now his wing the wave caresses,
                                    now he rises like an arrow
                                    cleaving clouds
                                    and
 
The poem is ripped
from my hand
and the air,
where only wayward clouds
had been,
is full of shouting,
accusations
a hand raised in anger
            ready to strike—
 
the world slows
in the second before
pain blooms
in my jaw;
       a second
to hope
the poem is
safe
in my mind
where fists
    and fury
cannot shake it free.


ordinary
 
Just because I am
small boned
and short,
brown haired
and brown eyed,
just because I look
           
common
as a wren
meek
as a robin
 
that does not mean
what is inside me is also
           
common
as a wren
meek
as a robin.
 
Everything
I wish for
is strange
aberrant
even wrong in this place
but I know
I cannot be the only one
blanketing her bright feathers
hooding her sharp eyes
hiding
in pla