My Parrot Has Died

By MIGUEL-ANGEL ZAPATA

 

My parrot has died in a clinic in Huntington. His life was a miracle
He was the envy of all the birds in the neighborhood. For five
years he sang a piece by Boccherini and knew a couple Mexican
pop songs by heart. When he got excited he whistled at the girls who
passed by my house.

When he was happy, the house was a joy. His harmonious whistling
infected with happiness the jealous parakeets in the other cage. Better I’d
been a canary, he would tell me: death is a lullaby beneath
a tremendous poplar that protects us. The poplar likes its family, and lets
fall its leaves like bloody money
. It is an enormous sky from
where they can see the waterfalls, the wings of the birds that return to see
water at the source.

Today I’m sad. My parrot was a piece of heaven in a world of fear.
Translated by Loren Goodman

 

Miguel-Angel Zapata books include Lumbre de la letra, Escribir bajo el polvo, El cielo que me escribe, Cuervos, Los muslos sobre la grama, the bilingual A Sparrow in the House of Seven Patios, and Fragmentos de una manzana y otros poemas.

Loren Goodman is the author of Famous Americans, Suppository Writing, and New Products.

Click here to purchase Issue 03

My Parrot Has Died

Related Posts

November 2024 Poetry Feature: New Work from our Contributors

G. C. WALDREP
I am listening to the slickened sound of the new / wind. It is a true thing. Or, it is true in its falseness. / It is the stuff against which matter’s music breaks. / Mural of the natural, a complicity epic. / The shoals, not quite distant enough to unhear— / Not at all like a war. Or, like a war, in passage,

Caroline M. Mar Headshot

Waters of Reclamation: Raychelle Heath Interviews Caroline M. Mar

CAROLINE M. MAR
That's a reconciliation that I'm often grappling with, which is about positionality. What am I responsible for? What's coming up for me; who am I in all of this? How can I be my authentic self and also how do I maybe take some responsibility?

Map of Silk Road

Silk Road

NIEVES GARCÍA BENITO
It is almost certain that the Europeans called it the Silk Road because of the opium. They made medicine with it to calm the pain. Its twilight doze between vigil and stupor soothed the soul, and opium spread out to all corners of the Earth, as did the Persian rugs with sweet colors.