There stood a crow outside my window
With hard coals for eyes that peered straight through to limbo
At times it seemed it could see straight through me
Into some futuristic omen only it could foresee.

This reaper so grim, dark, stately, and trim sat there quiet patiently high perched on a limb.
It was such a curious yet an eerie sort of bird, just gawking at me while not saying a word.
And if it opened its mouth what words would it speak, perhaps some wisdom of Plato, or some poetry from Keats?

I admit the strange creature I found a bit curious, yet its boisterous silence made me nothing but furious.
So on opposite sides of the window we remain,
With it picking its plumage and I wracking my brain.

At length could I no longer stand my callers silent duration,
So I pulled up a chair to make light conversation.
Finally, I came to myself and thought it absurd, to sit at a window and talk to a bird.

Quickly I grew weary of my persistent guest, and with a wave of my hand yelled “away with you pest”!

With that the crow returned with a courteous bow, there followed by a flapping of its wings
It let out a loud caw!!


I thought to myself, what could all of this mean,
Surely subconsciously I’m having a dream?

Till out of deep contemplation I abruptly was shaken
By a sound so familiar it could not be mistaken.
For above me frantically fluttering to each corner of my room
This bird like a banshee pronounced prophesies of doom.

Caw, caw! Caw, caw!
It repeated the same, as the first time it came calling at my window pane.

For a moment it sat there just gawking at the foot of my bed, frantically flapping its wings and bobbing its head.
Just for a moment peered I through those embers for eyes, and got a flicker of a glimpse of my foretelling demise.
Cursed me! I thought, this is the telling of my end, for over my head my shadow descends.

To my feathered reaper I pleaded and prayed that by some miracle this death sentence might somehow be stayed.
Has my plea come too late, Has Death sealed my fate?
At last I am making provisions for my own funeral wake.

Suddenly, in relief my visage was lifted, for from the claim for my soul, that reapers focus soon shifted.

It was there in the corner of its eye by the flicker of candle light,
That something slick and shiny caught fancy to its sight.



Suddenly, it swooped upon it without a moment's delay. Seizing the object in its beak and out the window it flew away.



Since then I sit and ponder how once I cheated death
Now the nightmares haunt me no longer, and the crow has long since left.

And so I sit here waiting at the spot where it all began for the call of an old feathered acquaintance whom once I invited in.
But no more upon that branch would the shadow of those black wings descend.
No more would the crows caw, caw! Come calling,
No more at my window again.