What a bird must feel with wings torn from spine or more
merciful, never grown hollow bone to bone at all, or heart
drained of blood, a stranger to purpose, a sky stripped
darkness, stars plucked out- a man and absent love.
What harms you, calls for you. To the mind of a child
the birthing room is light-filled, the unknown crib
is not a tomb. Your father's hand, the scythe it will become
wraps you like a horses tongue on newborn foal; names you.
No one cares about your drama now. It is important to exist
because the terrible, damaged can sing without voice, fly without
wing, beat without blood, shine in the darkness star-less
surviving the absence. What harms you, calls for you: listen.
