A Comfort of Swans

What if she had simply let her changeling
be? Even if she knew no word for cygnet,
how could she have been so blind?
She had raised hatchlings before.
Surely she knew this one was different.

The odd duck. Less than duck.
An abnormal duck. Something’s wrong
with that duck.

She could have defended him.
Seen the eldritch beauty
in his sleek neck, his white plumage,
marveled at the elegant wingspan.

Years later, after winters alone
evading the hunter's arrow,
even after the shock of recognition,
and after he found his mate, the shame
lingers. Whenever he flies, he averts
his gaze from the marshlands below.