I saw a thrush in the gallery
I don’t think it belonged there
It was haphazard and wrong
Although framed
And people addressed it in third person
While all it could do was
not flap

Well I thought it was beautiful

And reminded wistfully of sewn together promises
bandaged with more thread than cloth
It’s inevitable they will decay
It’s nature’s way

The way the thrush was nailed to that
piece of marble in the ostentatious
collection of other half-wit
dead things soaked
in the nighty marble
Frozen in time, limp
Placid like an
amber crystal like an
18th century lollipop
Like a dead grandpa
in an open-casket funeral
home in middle America

I saw a deer spine in the woods with
an intact head
She smiled at me
From the neck down
She was was picked clean; I was
reminded by mother:
Don’t worry, as I went to sleep
It’s nature’s way
The light was off but I stayed awake

I counted the stars and tried
to match them up with
all of the dead pets and people
in my life and they
matched
It was just about right

People leer at the dead thrush
Expecting it to do something
All it is is just is

People leer at the heart and
expect it to do something
All it is is just
Holding my bones together
Holding the wall together
Like a loop in the knit
Frick archives
Like a syllable
In the Tanakh
Like a stone
In a stream
Like a star
In the sky
It’s nature’s way.