Dear Eagles by Gabe Gudding

Gabe Gudding again. Here in letter form, a sort of riff on the eagle as a symbol of the U.S. The same craziness and fun and wild use of language. I don't share his sentiment here, but I love the way he writes. He could revive poetry, if people read poetry.

Dear Eagles

I am bored by beagles those happy dogs
so indelibly at gates. They’re unlike
the nation’s eagles who bang on gelid gusts
above our fields and shining logs. I am
not, thus, bored by yóu—all
your pleasures gentried, such epaulets
and fuss—and never over are the clawed towings
of fish with your angled feathers, no: Dó call me
an eagle lover, then. You are possibles.

Yet too you that once that were some symbols
of this nation that dealt some blows: you are not now
—nor are you ever always will be again—
ethicals,

your country’s over. And though you’re here still,
you will surely go.

For I have seen few snowmen outlast the snows.

Sincerely,

Gabriel Gudding


(First appeared in The Canary)


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