The Ambition Bird

So it has come to this insomnia at 3:15 A.M., the clock tolling its engine like a frog following a sundial yet having an electric seizure at the quarter hour. The business of words keeps me awake. I am drinking cocoa, that warm brown mama. I would like a simple life yet all night I am laying poems away in a long box. It is my immortality box, my lay-away plan, my coffin. All night dark wings flopping in my heart. Each an ambition bird. The bird wants to be dropped from a high place like Tallahatchie Bridge. He wants to light a kitchen match and immolate himself. He wants to fly into the hand of Michelangelo and dome out painted on a ceiling. He wants to pierce the hornet's nest and come out with a long godhead. He wants to take bread and wine and bring forth a man happily floating in the Caribbean. He wants to be pressed out like a key so he can unlock the Magi. He wants to take leave among strangers passing out bits of his heart like hors d'oeuvres. He wants to die changing his clothes and bolt for the sun like a diamond. He wants, I want. Dear God, wouldn't it be good enough to just drink cocoa? I must get a new bird and a new immortality box. There is folly enough inside this one.