Bird Nest in a Bell Jar by Bonnie Thibodeau


I put it under glass to keep,
because what else can I do with a woven cradle
when it falls from within my walls?

I don’t expect parents will return.
Still, I keep their house for them.
As if I could save the already-tumbled eggs
from cracking. I held them both, 
one in each hand, trying so hard for gentleness
with the right one that I crushed the one left.

I’m sad—more than I maybe should be. 
I’m sorry. As if I’m to blame.
As if it mattered. As if they weren’t 
empty shells already.

I preserve the nest with its forsaken eggs,
because what else can I do but wonder about the great beauty of birds
conceived in such small and simple rooms, wombs like speckled marbles. 




Bonnie Thibodeau holds an MA in English from West Virginia University. Previous publications can be found in Absence, Gyroscope Review, and Third Wednesday. She was also the 2013 winner of the Hungry Poet Prize. Her writing stems from her time spent in the woods and rivers of Southwestern Pennsylvania and West Virginia.





return to sampler            return to poetry             home