the poorwill
eases into torpor
inside a small
rocky crypt,
its body so
close to frozen
even the naked,
probing eye
thinks it’s dead.
This is how
it stays safe
until Spring.
I’ve done that.
And imagine
there’ll be many times
I’ll have to do it again.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 24, Issue 5.
Melissa Bałut Fondakowski is a professional nonprofit consultant. Bałut Fondakowski’s debut chapbook of poetry, Impatiens, was chosen as the winner of the Sow’s Ear Review poetry chapbook competition and her novel, Out, was published in 2017. Her reviews, articles, poetry and fiction have appeared, or are forthcoming, in Lavender Review, Women’s Studies Quarterly, San Francisco Magazine, the San Francisco Chronicle, Gia Reader, and more. Bałut Fondakowski writes regularly at Unfit to Print.
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