Tuesday, September 20, 2022

the wrong birds

Maybe it is the descent 

implicit in the way the symbols

stack, circles turning

inside circles, the wheel at work

as the end in the action eats

away. Something inevitable 

that structure of fitful scripture 

the cadence of water

rain making gutters into falls,

gray skies and dripping eaves,

want laying it on while

the battery runs down. The tree

written so often described unknown

as misnamed passerines,

raptors attached to the explicit 

tithes of divination and 

the divine, owls unseen 

closer than names

come the night. Half allusion 

three quarters vision from within,

the wings that do not pass

world after world, starlight 

and the negative space

a longhand sky leaves,

branch and bird, wind and world

saying everything a little bit off

stirring embers and giving smoke

waiting as the earth comes around.

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