16708220_10208952052418165_5456016437649641167_nSkim the stone on the surface
watch it butt against reflecting light
until falling through surface
out of sight it drops
to a darkness
or a peace
depending upon your vantage point
I for one would welcome
a life spent below, than above
listening to the mocking calls of unseasonal green parrots
filling trees with their envy
they make everything brighter it is true
yet something about the jarring
competitive nature of their plumage
strikes me as less sincere than
the drab and disliked pigeon with
old face and white circles around
his rumey blinking eyes
who can always be relied upon
to lose a toe in Winter
I think of how often I have watched
something curl to the side of a street
and wait to die
how a part of me felt helpless
inhabiting stages where stories
rent through armor and pierced
my conscience
after the third pigeon in a box
tucked beneath my office shoes
my boss told me
look, this is enough
he preferred I collected his shirts from the dry cleaner
bagfuls of shopping for his wife
my perk was
one day I could grow up to be like him
ignore dying birds in the street
driving silver BMW to my Thursday mistress
whilst another slave worked after-hours
filing life upward like blind builb
it came to me then, ungluing my eyelids
leaving behind one word
WRONG
written in magic marker on his desk
I took the cooing box I’d hidden
and the pigeon and I went home
to a cold flat with no furniture
where he proceeded to try not to die
and I watched understanding very well
the hue of his life
for I am a stone who sank before
she saw the sun and only the moon knows
the way to lift me up