Starling in the Furnace Room

First a small, muffled twittering,
wings flapping against louvered doors,
then a strange, panicked crying sound.  

My father suspecting a bat
slowly pries open the panels
while my brothers and I hold our  
breath on the basement steps, asking 

how the thing got in. Did it fold
itself through a crack between beams?
Did it fall through the chimney cap?

My father’s hands, deft as they are,
can’t defy the laws of motion.

I remember feathers flying,
a tiny heart that ceased to beat,
the afternoon suddenly dark, 
trapped in iridescent silence.

ROBERT FILLMAN

Robert Fillman is the author of the chapbook November Weather Spell (Main Street Rag, 2019). His poems have appeared in Nashville Review, Poet Lore, Tar River Poetry, Valparaiso Poetry Review, and others. He has a PhD in English from Lehigh University and is currently an assistant professor at Kutztown University. Fillman’s debut full-length collection, House Bird, will be published by Terrapin Books in 2022.