I’ve had about enough of the birds
returning from their season on the shore of hell.
Not the hell we learned about in books.

Not the birds we shushed away this morning
eating the dog’s food. Not the sky that
settles over our yard and yawns a blink.

I’m ready for spring’s sweet juice to promise
wet skin. Not the skin we tore off
in peels to open the earth for seed.

I don’t know enough to guide us safely
home. Not the home that recedes and
vanishes. Your breath, the last thing gone.

Appeal to the sky its decent benevolence.
Not the sky that turned a dry eye
on our drought until we had enough of birds and sky and hell.