Poetic response to “Not the Kind You Flip” prompt:
An ABC of Sparrows
We hatched from a nest
in the cursive “a”
of a Walgreens sign
this summer.
Listen here:
we’re like you – grew up
in a Mobil Mart “b”.
We splatter cars –
two, maybe three –
The carwash owes
us a kickback fee!
Our place is Culver’s Custard.
We gape there, in the bottom
loop of the upper case “C”.
We have neighbors too
in the lower case ”u”,
and the rounded, un-angular “v.”
I always pay attention to birds’ nests in store and restaurant signs. It gives me a companionable feeling to see and hear them as I do errands. I’d scratched out these verses a year or two ago, and pulled them out to work on when I saw this prompt. It was coincidence that I had a nest in an “a” and one in a “b” from the original verses. Culver’s Custard gave me the “c” and I decided to quit while I was ahead.
Sue Blaustein is the author and publisher of In the Field, Autobiography of an Inspector (2018) and chapbooks The Beer Line (2022) and All the Secrets Around Me (2025). She retired from the Milwaukee Health Department in 2016 after 25 years as a food safety inspector. She features and participates in open mics at poetry venues in and around Milwaukee.
