this morning I felt myself a bird

and stumbled into the pane of glass
that shields my shower;

for a brief moment

I became a limp body standing up,

with knees folded at acute angles
& elbows obtuse,

begging the ferryman
to float my feathered corpse into
the cleansing chamber.

he muttered assent
in my own voice-

and all the water in the atmosphere
poured directly through a hole
in the crown of my head,

it filled the hollows of my bones
and I no longer took flight.