Erica Goss
————-— after “Tea” by Leila Chatti
Because no one is here
to love me, I watch birds.
Five times each day,
I come outside and tilt my head
skyward. They circle, dive
and screech. I believe
in them, even if I don’t always
believe in myself. And though
I come from people
who have given up praying,
I need a god I’m not afraid of.
My life is so ordinary.
That’s why I try to notice joy
every chance I get. Maybe
that’s praying. I wish the birds
would care for me the way
I care for them. If one landed,
right now, on my shoulder,
my whole life would change.
It’s odd to want this, I know:
claws gripping my flesh,
a wing grazing my cheek—
but it would be the holiest thing
that ever happened to me.
Note: Señor de los pájaros (Lord of the Birds), Nayarit, photo by Graciela Iturbide, can be viewed on the Brooklyn Museum website.
Erica Goss is the author of Landscape with Womb and Paradox (Broadstone Books 2026) and Night Court. She has received numerous Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominations, and a 2023 Best American Essay Notable. Publications include The Colorado Review, The Georgia Review, Creative Nonfiction, and North Dakota Quarterly. Erica teaches, writes and edits the newsletter A Writer’s Homestead. http://www.ericagoss.com/