sparrows with wings beating
sing outside and above

they do not know the words

how much I would miss them
how I resent interruptions
they do not know

I had an alarm once
which mimicked their aubade

now I will never sleep through an authentic performance

they do not know that once I found
a bird-corpse, their comrade,
disfigured by rain

on a concrete path
they do not know I buried it

crouched on the nearby sod, clawing
the loose earth breathing its fragrant nectar

I scooped it up with a young oak leaf
fallen nearby or perhaps rain-pelted

I shrouded the corpse
tucked it into the earth-cavity
with a tenderness
(useless in its breathing days)
cold hands impressing the mud
smoothing the mound over

I do know more
than the sparrows

I still couldn’t tell you why

I carry the full moon in my womb
as I walk onto my own battlefield,

Mother says, Don’t you know girls grow inside grenades?

I watched her crawl forth from the wreckage on hands and knees,
a daughter crawling head-first out of
the blasted hollow of her home.

Girlhood grows around cyanide
and daughters metamorphose into
their mothers; it sounds like the crack
of a whip against dry bone ready for
kindle.

I followed Mother into the pit of
exile as a fresh girl, sanguine and blameless.

I followed the white rabbit.

Mother’s horror is a mirror
and I now own her trauma like
a trophy,

a haunted heirloom beating inside
like a second heart.

Get it out of me.