The Difference Between a Raven and a Crow

 

by Hillary Leftwich

 

I am dreaming of floods again and wildfires, too many omens have been ignored. The Farmer’s Almanac is always right. It tells me how farmers believed there would be no rain until the fields were burned to the ground. It tells me the difference between a raven and a crow is ravens always travel in pairs. Farmers can’t speak of the storms in my heart. I never told my father I can sense a person’s death. I am relieved when the neighbor dies in his sleep. His heart gave out before the fire ate its way into his house. My father took me camping when I was ten. Before we could pitch our tent the wind kicked up and rain came down, hard as fists. I watched our tent blow away while my father gave chase towards the swollen river. I saw a fawn struggling in the rapids as a doe paced the riverbank. My father let our tent blow by him as he sized up the whitewater, contemplating the jump. Today I fell asleep on the bus again. A baby’s screams woke me as rain pelted the windows and doors. The night my grandmother died I hit a raven head on with my car. I can smell the wildfires coming despite the rain. I can feel someone is drowning but all I see are the crows outside my window.

 

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Hillary Leftwich resides in Denver with her son. In her day jobs she has worked as a private investigator, maid, and pinup model. She is the associate editor for The Conium Review and Reader/Marketing Coordinator for Vestal Review. Her writing appears or is forthcoming in Hobart, Matter Press, WhiskeyPaper, NANO Fiction, Monkeybicycle, Dogzplot, Cease, Cows, Pure Slush, FlashFiction.net, Gone Lawn and others.