Sparrow

SPARROW

Rainfall, faint caw of possible

predator, and you did the no-brainer, 

making for the cracked window

of the nearest shelter. You left

them there—your brains—smeared

on the glass, your smudged

judgement the truest enemy,

and your battered body

fit snugly in the shallow hollow 

of my shovel. If you’re wondering, 

I laid you where I myself

have been been laid low,

again and again when my sheds

prove something less than 

satisfactory: at the foot of the tree

we abandoned in our panic,

there to lie while the roots

pry our ribs apart, devouring 

our hearts until—in the course

of slow and aching time—we rise

as sunlight edging the leaves.