Susan L. Leary

Daytime Manifesto

So much has happened & it’s not even noon. A bird flew
into the back window & we named the dead bird Charlie.
Rarely is death so quiet. Rarely do we recognize the sadness
before it recognizes us. Still, we map a way forward,
misery camouflaging our tendency towards music, towards
the unforgettable era of car rides with our mothers. Today,
I struggle with progress. Behind the wheel, no bones to spit,
no skeleton dangling at the back of my throat. Only
a pitstop at the nearest exit for soda & chicken nuggets
every 200 miles. I’m average because I want to be, because
I’m told driving behind the slowest car will save me
from the fires up ahead. Not all birds are resurrected by food
& water. Not all light prevents our thinking about loss.
On the radio, every vanished tune blasting from a preferable
hour. Look at me now, with my hair up & my nails done,
arriving late to the pageant, still dressed in yesterday’s
clothes. I’ll take my good intentions & your cruelest summer,
my lost religion & your everlasting love. I never want it
to be easy, making the most of a life I never asked for.

Susan L. Leary is the author of A Buffet Table Fit for Queens (Small Harbor Publishing, 2023), winner of the Washburn Prize; Contraband Paradise (Main Street Rag, 2021); and This Girl, Your Disciple (Finishing Line Press, 2019), finalist for The Heartland Review Press Chapbook Prize and semi-finalist for the Elyse Wolf Prize with Slate Roof Press. Her poetry and nonfiction have appeared in such places as Tar River Poetry, Superstition Review, Tahoma Literary Review, Cherry Tree, The MacGuffin, Jet Fuel Review, jmww, and Pithead Chapel. Recently, she was a finalist for the 16th Mudfish Poetry Prize, judged by Marie Howe. She holds an MFA from the University of Miami, where she also teaches Writing Studies. Visit her at www.susanlleary.com.