I Saw the Parade of Snakebirds & Understood

I saw the parade of snakebirds & understood
why people name their children things like triumph

I misread soft pretzel as self-portrait
The day was otherwise normal

in that I pretended it was Though
the glory of the day is stillwater

there are honeysellers everywhere
All those trees

who warn their neighbors of bitter
danger & pass electric sighs

through fungi & will so long survive
us At night I chew on heart-shaped

sprinkles, ball-shaped sprinkles,
chicken dust I whittle half a stick

of butter with my unglamorous
front teeth When the radio says scarcity

I think of my mother who would
eat the bones if she could These long noons

do have wartime vibes Waking up
to slide into the dread machine

Who constructs the smaller
crane that constructs the crane

flies? someone said shotgun a million
hours ago & I loved him

& I still do Not for that
An accident: getting close enough

to smell a stranger’s cologne, my lonely
only bones twanged My stomach tripped

over its own shadow, glories of the day
Nude & clotting ghosts descend

to bother our hair in the springtime
Glorious birdsong shattering on windowpanes

Glorious sheet of ochre pollen

pummeling untouched
automobiles I change my clothes

so the mailwoman isn’t frightened
for me when she, ten seconds each

afternoon, speaks between the slats
of the screened porch

Is anticipatory grief not still
just fucking grief?

Wept glory falling on the brightly pink mimosas

Floridian sun in its great febrile glory

I am learning to love you in this inside way

Tender unborn beech we will have survived
this in order to know you

Little scarlet-nosed friend

Little worm that I scrounge beside