<\/p>\n
The Absence of Birds<\/strong><\/p>\n The leaves rustle Then silence.<\/p>\n I think about the absence <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Sally Long<\/strong> has an MA in Creative Writing from the University of East London and is a PhD student at Exeter. She has had poems published in magazines including Agenda, Haiku Quarterly, Ink, Sweat and Tears, London Grip, Poetry Salzburg Review <\/em>and Snakeskin.<\/em> Sally edits Allegro Poetry Magazine<\/em> www.allegropoetry.org<\/a> .<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Absence of Birds The leaves rustle releasing a surprised sparrow, thrushes answer one another, the red kite static above my head, I trace the magpie\u2019s undulating flight and hear rooks call from distant trees. Then silence. I think about the absence of birds, until a pigeon clatters from the branches and a robin […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12464","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12464","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12464"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12464\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13249,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12464\/revisions\/13249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nreleasing a surprised sparrow,
\nthrushes answer one another,
\nthe red kite static above my head,
\nI trace the magpie\u2019s undulating flight
\nand hear rooks call from distant trees.<\/p>\n
\nof birds, until a pigeon clatters
\nfrom the branches and a robin sings.
\nThe birds were always present
\nbut those thoughts
\noh my thoughts\u2026<\/p>\n