It Spoke of Its Broken Bones (poem)
It Spoke of Its Broken Bones
The language master tracing lines of typeface with his finger
The bronze smith’s Victory and Lamentation
Her strength in dry dirt bordered with
Black shadow
All bedlam courses past
She lights her wings unfurl
With an odor of things suspended
Warm stalls imbued with reverent thought of fodder
Thin switches wait to chastise balkers
Rain that falls pursues no purpose
You my utterance unknit
Meek and fearful circumstance
Your sense I take from ink and paper
Cannot exist on any other
Then a neighbor straight as sunlight
Named outright American chimera
With the great events behind indifference
On the soul’s high eve
Traces lines that breathe
A venturesome one crept forth
With bottlebrush tail and lowered ears
It spoke
of its broken bones
“But I move myself along;
I do, I move myself along”
I move under a rain of fire
What is the smallest thing that cares
Cares because it can be seen
where the hand comes thundering
Night Bird
(2016, Stephanie Foster)