This morning,
at breakfast,
clad in green smoke,
Humming-girl paid
a visit and darted
between the fizz and
drizzle of gray rain,
unspattered.
Mid-air, she paused –
suggestion of form
and wings; an aura,
a blur –
to observe us encased
in our glass-walled
box.
We think ourselves
sovereign. Free.
Absurd.
In a breath and a wink,
she was
gone.
— C.Birde, 9/21
“I will lounge…”
she extended her limbs,
“…in all my cholorophylled,
green-gold glory
& drink August
to its last,
sweet
dregs.”
— C.Birde, 8/21
Too slight
to bend
the primrose stem,
They perch –
small bright motes
of yellow light –
and pluck
the coneflowers’
seeded
crowns.
— C.Birde, 8/21
Before
before I
before I can
comprehend the
nature
nature of
nature of this
funerary scene &
extend
extend my
extend my offer
of service …
The scenario, in its entirety –
options, challenges, solutions –
have all efficiently been
noted, discussed, addressed
with no need of my aid &
I can
I can only
I can only stand &
observe
from a distance
of un-necessity.
— C.Birde, 8/21
“Remember?
When first
we beheld
one another?”
She rustled
& sighed.
“How the world
tilted ‘round
our axis…”
— C.Birde, 8/21
Gluttonous of peaches –
I am grasping
greedy
miserly to shameful
degree.
“Let the juice run down
the chin”?
Nonsense.
Folly.
Shameful profligacy.
Serrated knife peels
brushed-velvet skin,
slices slim bright grins
from deep-grooved
stone.
Like myth & love,
I swallow whole.
Every liquid vein,
each mouthful –
mine alone.
Savor
savor…
Ingest
the whole of Summer’s
transient warmth,
ward against impending
cold.
— C.Birde, 8/21
Grit teeth grinding
bone-on-bone
Internal skree
of brittling dust
falls d-o-w-n
the shift-stacked
ivory column
Collects
Barnacles
Erodes smooth glide
of movement
Nibbles
Gnaws
Bites
A dull, full-rayed star
radiating dis-
ease.
— C.Birde, 8/21
Our hands move
Stir the dark
Reflect the light
emanating from her skin,
from the dusky spill
of her hair
Where she sits –
luminous, aglow –
in a high-backed chair
carved of ebony
Our hands –
pale moths winging
about her flameless
conflagration –
shift the aromatic
dark
Aflutter
Replicating her glow,
her light.
— C.Birde, 8/21
“Go,
Stray,
Wander
as you must &
as you need…”
Her voice vined,
fruited
with wild grapes.
“When you return,
I will
astonish.”
— C.Birde, 8/21
There –
there it is…
Rub of grit
Scrape of coal
Shard
at the center
of all things
Grief
in the rose’s
soft pleated heart
Unease
in summer’s blue
unclouded sky
Gather it up,
this unfledged
wisdom
Safeguard &
croon to it
Greet it gently &
grant it
a safe space
to root &
grow.
— C.Birde, 8/21