Some ones party balloon
Escaped from a small hand
Clings to a branch
outside
my bedroom
Window
It leaving its party too soon
a shimmering mylar
rodent string tail
caught-
a runaway
panting
in a trap.
I want to
cut it down
and pick up the party
before all life
drains out -
slowly.
I can’t reach
though
like so many
plastic grocery bags
drifting waste
bobbing
above my grasp
artifacts of past
communions
floating by.
The shine of ‘Happy’
collapses time
Upside down
string flaccid
Winter
its only breath-
a shuddering in cold bursts
of grey.
Slowly
Spring green
molds over it
decay
I forget
As it eases into waves of softer air.
buds form
And robins pull worms
In its shade’s
exhausted judgement.
Summer breezes
bounce it’s flaked shine briefly
between
The flickering
Of leaves
“I’m still here”
it winks
Until
the Fall
sheds its cover
leaves float
down in spirals
revealing
shimmer- gone- grey
and dull.
life and air
No longer animate.
Spreading apart into
beautiful
diminishing
frail
shards
Nature takes its turn
small hands fashion
it into a squirrels nest
the moveable Birthday Party – long over.
It’s empty string dangles nothing to lift it.
A boy still searching the sky
to grab
for its return,
Sorry
but,
The squirrels
seem to be
Happy