Thanksgiving, 1998 - Brittany Helmick

How would my mother prepare me?—

slice my neck off before severing my wings

at the first joint, hang me upside down at eye

level, a snapping motion against the grain.

My bronze feathers fall like baby hair, she

continues until clean, until I am inside

this bag that grows tighter every year.

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Brittany Helmick is a Pacific Northwest native and MFA candidate in the Northeast Ohio Master of Fine Arts program. She was a 2019 Sustainable Arts Award finalist. Her work has appeared in Manastash, Akron Life Magazine, The Journal of American Language, Project Muse, and at Empty Mirror.