Extinction by Erik Carlsen


Nobody will ever tell you
How your voice sounds like a Passenger pigeon
Or that your legs are long like a Javan lapwing

You are never going to be as curious as a Gould’s mouse
Or as strong as an aurochs when you overturn the birdbath
Before the first frost

I have never seen Schomburgk’s deer
Grazing in their small herds or leaping
Over my backyard fence

In a dream I pet a Fuegian dog
Who growled at spearmen in the shadows
Who drank from cool water in the hollow of my side

I have held the skull of the last warrah
Touched under its jaw and felt desperation
In the bone

Before the stitches went in and my bone was there
I felt that same thing, too
The peace of knowing you are the last of your kind


Erik Carlsen

ERIK CARLSEN, a lifelong Tacoma native, is pursuing an MA in Poetry from Southern New Hampshire University.

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(That’s) What Friends Are For by Joshua Swainston