on smashing my windows
F.D. Hudson
to let the birds in; they cannot fit
through the slim opening i have left
them. they are tired of the silent spring
and are begging for bread crumbs to feed them.
for the fragrance of flowers blooming
to no audience. even the bees, it seems,
are practicing stay-in-honeycombes.
so who, then, will praise their perfume?
for the jungle plant in my living room
with its branches reaching to the corner
of the windowpane where the sunlight lies.
it would seem even this stolid tree is lonely too.
for the slowly warming air, slipping morsels
of freedom through the open cracks.
even with the fans on, this sterile atmosphere
struggles to move.
to feel the spring showers, rather than
simply hear droplets pattering on the sill,
while i watch puddles gather in the sidewalk
only to disappear by the morning.
so that i may shout at the sole passer-
by beneath me. just a simple hello,
reconfirming that simple greetings still
have meaning, hollered from such out-of-practice lungs.
for the melancholy earth, surely missing
its spring partakers playing in the grass,
holding picnics, throwing frisbees,
racing through the air that surrounds us like a blanket.
but most of all to know
that there is something to be done
about being forcefully alone
besides sitting and waiting for it
to be over.
Foster Hudson is an 18 year old poet from New Jersey. When he’s not writing, he’s usually feeding his cat or staring wistfully out his window. He will begin attending Swarthmore College in the fall. His work has previously appeared in Fleas on the Dog, Black Horse Review, and Sheepshead Review, among others.