It is with great joy that I share my poem, “In Memoriam.” The poem took Second Place in the Mnemosyne Award category of the 2018 Georgia Poetry Society fall contests. It appears in this year’s edition of The Reach of Song, a poetry anthology published annually by the society. The title of the anthology comes from a poem by renowned Georgia poet Byron Herbert Reece.

 

In Memoriam

One by one

they drop from the sky

and find their perches among

thin, lithe boughs

of a leafless white oak tree,

now a sharp silhouette sketched in inky black lines

against an ominous steel-gray sky

Only a few stubborn patches of lichen

dare to cling here or there like crepe

left behind on the empty branches

Dried sunflowers in the garden

hang their heads in grief and disbelief

They know their end has come

The mourners are wearing their funereal finest

Sleek, ebony feathers reflect the slanted rays of

the afternoon sun but find no warmth in this place

Shiny, black eyes survey the sight below them

One of their own, felled by the farmer’s gun,

is strung from a rope on the barbwire fence

A warning, a sign to his kindred

They are not welcome here

They might share his fate

In solemn respect the mourners sit in silence

A brief corvine ceremony of peace and respect

Then all at once the service concludes

as if some unseen chorus master has waved his baton

They lift their wings and fly away together,

each one calling out to one another

in discordant voices only they understand

A benediction for their fallen comrade

 

                                                                                    Carroll S. Taylor

 

 

The judge for the Mnemosyne Award commented:

 In Memoriam comes at the reader with vivid visual imagery. It reads like an artist’s black and white photograph, with sharply drawn contrasts. The word pictures of death and mourning are dramatic. The stark warning of the dead bird brings to mind violence humans commit against each other and serves as its own warning and cautionary tale.”

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