Call and Response by Martha Christina

I do the supper dishes alone,
after another supper alone;

Ellington’s Solitude, turned
down low on the CD player.

Over that aching music,
a male cardinal riffs

seven notes, and from
the distance: an answer.

One calls, one responds,
over and over, changing

solitude to just another
way of listening, until

the lingering light
of the new Spring fades,

and the cardinals’ voices,
like yours, fall into the dark.



Martha Christina is a frequent contributor to Brevities. Longer work appears in Innisfree Poetry Journal, Naugatuck River Review, earlier postings of Red Eft Review, and most recently in the anthology Ice Cream Poems from World Enough Writers. She has published two collections: Staying Found (Fleur-de-lis Press) and Against Detachment (Pecan Grove Press).