Joy Gonsalves
MENAGERIE
Observe the breakable bird,
both compass and a root,
eking shadows on the wall. It is fixed,
at least, on alighting. Living things
have made homes in its claws.
In one lost corner, a woman needs
dusting. Called to fetch the day
with her chin, to slip the evening
a sin, to catch a drop of water and a coat--
she’d like to trim the wick on her finger.
And here, a man without hands,
feet, or breath, is loosened from the rubble
of roadbuilding. A spare wire driven
through a block rests his body on air.
He has begun to smell like the seasons.
Inocencio says they are his creations,
these wayside boughs that neither
trees nor passersby want. He preserves
the shape given them by rain, wind, the toe
of a boot. But first to whittle them: from banyan
to bird, woman to light, leper to resurrection.
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