Birch forests sound
unlike other canopies.
At first I thought
about confetti, but
it’s not that. The leaves
color up like it,
drifting toward a glazed
hardwood, sticking on
someone’s forehead
sweat. No, it’s ocean
waves rushing
with a steadiness—
how dull. They could
double for a sound
machine. I stood
a few yards from
the birch copse,
under different branches,
and the white limbs
were the only ones
in sway, as if none
of the other trees
had the sea, bent
tops to the breeze.
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Sandra Marchetti is the author of three full-length books of poetry, DIORAMA (Stephen F. Austin State UP, 2025); Aisle 228 (SFA UP, 2023); and Confluence (Sundress Publications, 2015) as well as four chapbooks of poetry and lyric essays. Their poetry appears in Ecotone, Poet Lore, Blackbird, Southwest Review, Subtropics, and elsewhere. Essays and stories can be found in AWP’s The Writer’s Chronicle, Pleiades, Mid-American Review, Barrelhouse, The Account, and other venues. They are Poetry Editor Emerita for River Styx Magazine.
