from THE BIRD ARTIST
Eventually, I learn to tighten the screws with minimal damage.
The breakfast oranges, the daylilies from the garden, all rife
with success. The way the babies fat and their accoutrements
bleach white in the sun. For fun, we cover them in blankets and are always surprised
at the game. They squeal with delight at everything. The deer.
The foxes sniffing round the porch. The tiny metal cuckoo
in the box with the broken spring. They finger it's gears and smash it on the table
but still nothing comes from it--no movement, no sound. It's dead the way
all shiny things die eventually from disuse. The way all things
slow through the afternoon, songless by nightfall. The cuckoo jerks sometimes
and comes to life, but only if you crush it in your palm. The babies crying
and the kitchen filthy, only when we whisper hush.
