Poetry by Sandra Maddux-Creech (Edgar Allan Poe)

The Parrot
by Sandra Maddux-Creech
Inspired by Edgar Allan Poe

Once upon a misty morning, as my paper I was scorning
And my filling it with words was coming awfully hard and slow
Through the night, I had been trying; all my might I’d been applying
But alas, my page lay empty, and it seemed t’would tarry so
With my eyes half-mast and red, I thought to bed I soon would go
Came a voice, it said, “Hello.”

The voice, it sounded birdly, thought I to myself absurdly
But I turned to seek its owner as I answered its hello
T’was a parrot speaking to me, just as if the scoundrel knew me
Sitting, staring, from the travis of my sitting room window
‘Round its neck, it wore a painted placard, swinging to and fro
Reading, “Edgar Allan Poe.”

Once upon a midnight dreary, as I pondered weak and weary…
It began to quote, as I sat, mesmerized by this tableau
On and on the bird recited, as his audience delighted
In his knowledge of the works of that discerning poet, Poe
Spouted he so many rhymes, and some of which I did not know
Rhymes of Edgar Allan Poe


“Lord have mercy,” I expired. Was this parrot so inspired
By this poet that he mastered the entire works of Poe?
And I wondered, as I listened, why the bird had been so christened
Was he never taught the simple phrases parrots generally know?
Could he also utter Emerson, Longfellow, and Thoreau?
Quoth the parrot, simply, “No.”

But it happened that this parrot, with a gift and will to share it
Did a dance upon my keyboard in a splendid rousing show
I sat, entertained and giggling at his funky, fowly wiggling
And the contents of my paper, I did scarcely care to know
Through the hallways, I went dancing with the clever bird in tow
Me, and Edgar Allan Poe

Author bio:

Sandra Maddux-Creech's work will appear in THEMA this February and has appeared in Arabesques Review, SmokeLong Quarterly, Ballyhoo Stories, and others. She has been a finalist in contests sponsored by Glimmer Train and Many Mountains Moving, and her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She earned her MFA at Colorado State University.