Epitaph For A Small Bird*
I found you
hard
against the park railings,
shattered wings
draped
like a soiled duvet
across your throat;
blooded,
frozen like black ice,
as black as the shiny
pebble
of your eye;
and the awkward beak,
twisted,
as if to stifle a cry.
You must have seen
everything
on your way down:
the auto-pilot failure, the
headrush
of intimidating steel.
All those last-minute phone calls and
frantic
text messages
they never heard.
Lost
among the steel and gorse,
in the crowded city,
love
refused to go quietly.
*First published in Verse Libre Quarterly - www.VLQpoetry.com
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