FLIGHT OF THE TANGERINE CANARY
throughout the ignorant suburbs backyard grass
is turning yellow/ big beach towels flap along
hills hoists & swimming pools fill slowly by
long rubber hoses/ sprinklers & trampolines
are chopping up lawns into mud/ & canaries
hang inside wire cages like swaying plants on
hooks/ waiting for the wind to take them on a
dark flight into concrete/ once a week bird-shit
newspaper, grass seed husks & dirty lime water
receives its freedom/
one gust of wind & the
tangerine canary has stopped singing/ in the
suburbs crash landings of lovebirds into ruined
cage interiors/ tiny wings outstretched from
bird chests for three seconds as cages take
flight/ all birds will fly on a good high wind/
the canary flew for the first time inside the
cage which was hurtled/ it flew suspended in a
wire capsule until gravity smashed down its
small worlds/
a five-year-old girl climbed the
grey fence to look over at what the wind had
done/ her brown hair in a parted fountain &
shiny fringe like dark wood/ with eyes too sad
for a five-year-old/ water runs along cement
like tears from a broken interior/ cuttlefish
is fragmented like a jigsaw from the ocean/
bird grit has smashed itself to grey smithereens
& the seed bell has cracked in half/ five years
of suburban bird bad luck/ as the wind moves
on through dislodged perches into the next
backyard/
looking down to where the cage has
fallen are slippers with teardrops/ two flares
in dolly socks & veined legs in soft shoes as
black as the factory machinery/ & what did the
family see?/ they saw five dead birds in five
dead mirrors/ & tiny curled up claws & silver
bells like knocked out organs/ a thimble head
hung limp from a delicate neck/ & a tangerine
songless bird beneath its plastic swing/ both
eyelids shut & blood from its earhole hidden
by feathers |
