what does the blue jay think
when an egg falls from its nest?
how does the spider handle the bat
feasting on its young?
each time another leaf slips from my limbs
it hurts all the way down to my heartwood
I feel the emptiness in my arms
the immutable echo of vacant boughs
my roots untethered
I once saw a fawn dangling
from the power line beneath my crown
eagle owl
I do not know who dropped it there
as I looked into the black
marble eyes of the fawn
struck open tongue lolling
neck snap folded over the line
I worried where is its mother?
will she think to look up to find her missing child?
will she feel the gnawing pain
in her heartwood?
the razor sharp arrow
shredding the bark?
I do not know how a bullfrog croaks
I do not know what the mole thinks
blind above ground
but the stabs of motherhood?
well
the harsh season
the brutal rake
the bonfire
hand me a seed
& I can tell you
sorrow awaits.
-Audrey Colasanti
Audrey Colasanti is a former award-winning advertising copywriter turned photographer/poet. Much of Audrey’s poetry reflects on her perspectives of untypical parenthood and searching for meaning in everyday encounters with nature and urban living. She writes about everything from the smell of hospital rooms to wanting to eat a lilac bush. Audrey’s photography is whimsical with a definite urban bent. She does not shy away from photographing the macabre, unusual or just plain fanciful. To Audrey, “Photography is poetry from the eyes. Poetry is photography of the mind.”
Audrey is also co-founder of “Brainstorms – Artists With Epilepsy” a nationally recognized art initiative for those affected by seizures. The collection, sponsored by the Epilepsy Foundation of Minnesota, currently hosts over one hundred artworks (including by her son, Dominick). The collection also has one piece in the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
POETRY/ARTICLES: Published, Minneapolis Star Tribune, 2015 Published, Epilogues, 2014, 2015, 2016 Published, Minneapolis Southwest Journal, 2016 Published, Birds Of A Feather, 2017 Published, So Far, chapbook compilation of Poetry Project graduates, 2020 Published, Prometheus Dreaming, Friday Poets,“Pearly Whites,” 2020 Reading, Zeus Jones, Minneapolis, MN Reading, Hook & Ladder Theatre, Minneapolis, MN Reading, EFMN Creative Arts Showcase, Minneapolis, MN Reading, Upsher-Smith, Minneapolis, MN Reading, Loft Literary Center, “Poetry Project” Finalist, Loft Literary Center Mentor Series in Poetry, 2016 Graduate, “Poetry Project” taught by Danez Smith, 30 Under 30 Emerging Artist/Forbes Magazine.
Photographer / Poet website: acolasanti.com
instagram: audreycolasanti audcaker@yahoo.com