Building a Bird: a poem

 Building a Bird

 

As I walk outside, I glance at
the ground, collecting feathers
like small hopes between my
fingers. I like to think the hope
is for you and me, though
the collecting started before
we met. Yet now some significance
has attached itself to this gathering
of down and particles that hold
the possibility of flight:
flight being something you partook of
two months ago from our partnership
and still I search through the air
for these signs of your return,
these particles of your remembrance,
this memory of a brightness sewn between us
I swore was truly there.
Now, when I reach out for you,
what do I wish to accomplish?
What future awaits the two of us,
when only one hand is outheld?
So I wait, and walk, and search,
feather by feather, hoping to build
this winged bridge for you to step
over someday. Or perhaps this pile
shall come together and form a bird
that flies to you and unites us,
leads you back to me. Or rather
I shall don this plumage myself
and fly free into the hope of tomorrow,
not worrying what it might bring.

 

by Julie S. Paschold
aka Tansy Julie the Soaring Eagle

2.13.26

Letting Go After the Windstorm: a poem

 

Letting Go After the Wind Storm

This morning there’s a dusting of snow
on everything as if the world has
been salted. Yesterday it was so cold
and still, the view was a painted
landscape. It was difficult to believe
the displaced trash can across the street
had just recently been scooting
down the road from the wind,
the trees waving, branches falling
to the ground, garbage flying
to distances unknown. How things
change as the days progress. I still
think of you, but the terrible ache
feels more clouded, your memory
farther away. Is this what it feels like
to let go?  I’m sorry I could not be
perfect for you. Two days ago
I was touched by three different people
and I felt relief, the diffusing of
a nailed balloon that had been
piercing my chest. So this is what
it is like to be cared for. I had forgotten.
I have a life you do not know.
I am building new roots, reaching
new soil, finding new comfort.
You are still within me somewhere,
always, but this new life is what
you wished for me. The growth
after the windstorm. The salt
after the stillness.
Let spring come.
I shall wait for her. I
shall be ready.

  

by Julie S. Paschold
aka Tansy Julie the Soaring Eagle
1.24.26

Tattered Moth: a poem

"Tattered Moth" by Julie S. Paschold

aka Tansy Julie the Soaring Eagle

Poet, Artist, Agronomist from Nebraska. Author of Horizons (won 2024 Nebraska Book Award) & Human Nature. Resident Poetry Instructor at Omaha’s Lauritzen Gardens. Speaker for Humanities Nebraska Speaker’s Bureau. Semi-finalist in Kate Sommers Memorial Prize, honorable mention in two Writer's Digest contests. 

Dancing With Purpose

 Dancing with Purpose
A Poem

Dancing with Purpose
--After Aaron Davis

What are you afraid of?
he asks in a podcast online
earlier in the day and it
sticks with me
not able to answer that
not able to articulate exactly
what I’m not confronting
or what I’m wanting
What is my potential?
He tells me to start walking
in purpose—
toward what?
I don’t know yet

Later that night
at a costume party
in front of the fire
we start talking about dancing
now that we’re sober—
something I haven’t done
my sweatshirt covering
my costume

I’m pulled into the center
of the circle, sweatshirt off,
told if I’ve got it, flaunt it,
wear it, may I take a picture,
whoops and hollers.
But still I don’t dance.

What am I afraid of?

Late that night, held in bed, 
it comes to me as my man whispers 
I got you:
I’m afraid to be seen unhindered,
I’m afraid of pleasure, of joy.
As if I don’t deserve it
as if dancing implies a loss of control
one step towards crazy:
she’s lost it, like anyone cares.

I’m not afraid of what people think,
I’m afraid of what I feel when I let go:
that freedom, that flying,
that belly-dropping openness.
I’m afraid to dance.

So tomorrow I’m playing the music.
I’m taking off the bulky clothes.
I’m loving the me that I am now.
I’m dancing…
no matter who’s watching.

No walking in purpose. Instead,
I’m dancing in purpose. 
Without fear.

By Julie S. Paschold

10.26.25

Julie S. Paschold (Tansy Julie the Soaring Eagle) is a poet and artist from Nebraska with a BS and MS in agronomy from the University of Nebraska at Lincoln. They have published three poetry books. Horizons (Atmosphere Press: paperback & audiobook) honors soil through family, identity, and nature, and won a Nebraska Book Award in 2024. Their chapbook You Have Always Been Here (Bass Clef Books: paperback) is an unconventional love story.  Human Nature (WSC Press: paperback & Atmosphere Press: audiobook) explores humanity’s ecological and environmental connection to nature and the planet earth. Julie is the resident poetry instructor at Omaha’s Lauritzen Gardens and is registered with the Humanities Nebraska Speakers Bureau. Julie has been published in a wide range of publications. Their poem “Multitudes of Blue Arrows” was a semi-finalist in the first Kate Sommers Memorial Prize in 2023, and two of their chapbooks won honorable mention in contests by Writer's Digest in 2021 and 2022. They volunteer for the international Human Library Organization.