My Owls

Snowy Owls flew in through my window.
Mom and baby rest on my desk.
Mysterious and peculiar as magic,
they are made of old metal.

Mom and baby rest on my desk.
Recycled, they’re painted white
like me, made of old metal,
beaks almost flat as their cheeks.

Recycled, they’re curious creatures.
Like me, held together with rivets,
their beaks almost flat as their cheeks.
They're sculpted into beauty from a dump.

Like me, held together with rivets,
strange and peculiar as magic,
bent into beauty from junk,
my owls slid in through the window.

Patricia Gray was awarded an Artist Fellowship in Poetry in 2023 from the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities. Also that year, she was a finalist for the 55th Millennium Writing Award. She formerly headed the Library of Congress’s Poetry and Literature Center. An award-winning poet, her work has been published this year in The Raven’s Perch, The Plentitudes, The Mid-Atlantic Review and in Hill Rag. Her MFA is from UVA.