Unseen bird thumping
against glass
then flying away
unhurt 

Bursts of clacking
as downy woodpeckers
hammer their beaks
into bricks of seed

Fanfare of chirps
and wings flapping as
next door’s hunting cat
charges and fails as always

then inevitably
the sound of them
all returning together
immediately 

and that damned squirrel
at it again — probing
the cages to see what
could be gained there

They say you should
take your feeders down
in summer or never put them
up at all but truly

I would be lost and crazy
if I did as this is how
I make myself want 
to look outside

at something other than
the red black backs
of my eyelids shut tightly
against anything but myself

My legacy
will not be one
of honor and fame,
I know. No 
easy rest for me
in the knowledge of
a lasting memory
what I’ve done.
I suspect instead
that there will be
for only a few years
a flurry of 
brief, vague 
comments upon
who I was
and what I
left behind
and then
the forgetting
will begin
and that
will be all,
will have to be 
satisfactory. 
I’m practicing
for it now: blending
into the curtains
drawn across
the windows
that look out upon
the bright bright
world. Soon enough
I’ll be pulled back
so people can see
how it shines.
Maybe a few 
will learn to love
what I left behind:
tales of how
to take shelter
in the dark
that inevitably follows
the dimming
of the day.

stop 
playing musical chairs
with people who are told beforehand
when the music will stop so they are
always ahead of you in getting to
a seat. 

stop
playing double dutch
with people who can tie a noose
in the rope and catch you by the neck
in mid-air before you
touch down.

stop 
pretending life 
is no longer grade school. 
it will always be
battleground recess, 
every day. 

stop
thinking that bully and bullied
isn’t the name of the big game
we start playing early
and are made to play until
very late.

you
have choices. pick a side
or walk away. play the role
written for you or 
write another game for yourself
to play. but

whatever
you choose, stop pretending
the streetlights are not yet on
and it is not time to come in
from the dark before it gets too dark
to win.

If I am chosen
or doomed to this

then let me be it
fully

Let me make and sling
the necessary fists

for those who will not raise their own
to strike back at their tormentors

Let me roil the rising water
with my anger

for those committed to calm
when there is truly none to be had

Let me walk ahead 
of those willing to be slain

despite their calls for peace
and let me bring the sword they will not carry

Let me long for a different fate
even as I fulfill the one I’ve been given

Let me go wrongly 
among the righteous as they cannot

Let me die if I must
doing what others cannot or will not

and if I must die that way
let it be said of me

that balance was my only aim
and while I was willing I was not joyous

in the role I was assigned
I longed for an easy life and death

but it was not for me
Nothing of it was for me

Overcome today with the understanding
that if there is a meaning to the universe
I’m merely a period closing one routine
sentence in the owner’s manual,

and if I’d been left out from the beginning
the meaning would still be clear from context.
My absence would mean nothing at all
except to the most nitpicky readers.

I am not absent
but I am minuscule in comparison
to the broad sweep of the text.
It’s a comforting thought. Nothing

depends on me, you say? No more
than on anything else? That’s 
a cold lick of freedom indeed, 
and as I fade into the invisible background

I’m thinking less and less, 
feeling more and more, and 
more or less invigorated by this,
I turn toward the light with a smile.

A truck goes by.
One cat sleeps,
the other runs. 

I do nothing but watch.
I do nothing but tell
stories — some are even
true.

Was there a truck? 
I think so. If not, 
I’ll make it so.
Such power in lying
if this is a lie.
Such resolute power
in sitting and watching
if one can tell a story afterward.

The cat who ran knows this.
The one who sleeps might know this
or might not.

I can choose
the stories to tell
about the cats and turn them
into fodder. One’s sleeping in a box
and maybe isn’t even aware
that I’m here. The other one’s
ears keep twitching at the sound
of my keyboard. Maybe. Maybe
they move at the sound of starlings,
or in fear of the truck returning,

if there was a truck.

Schrodinger failed to account
for the observations
of the cat in the box
regarding the nature
of living and dying. He knew
the discussion was ridiculous.
He chose his story without asking
the cat for its view. The cat was likely
more afraid of trucks on the street
than such a story as his.

It would be nice
to know the truth.
Truth be told, I suspect
it would be best for me
to just pet the cats,
both of them,
while we’re all still here. 

A backhanded prayer,
a promise made in a meadow,
a body twisting,
a whole zoo of animal thoughts,
small-town bravery
in the face of big town
midnight,
a teacher rolling dice that nothing
will go any more wrong,
vacated bodies handled 
gently by lesser superheroes,
no victory to be had, 
no power to which to offer sacrifice,
no reason,
no reason,
no reason.

Say that phrase no one will admit they love.
Say it as if you are proud to say it: I don’t care. 

Say it with your whole body as you turn away from today.
Say it symphonically, as a string quartet might play it:  I don’t care. 

So much to think about when you stare at everything all day long.
So many people you don’t know want to discuss all this. Say it: I don’t care. 

Say it as if it could cure the poisoned air, as if our need to weigh in
has turned such an admission into Magick: I don’t care. 

As if your opinion matters without action, if it matters at all with
or without action. Let your tone of voice be your action. Say it: I don’t care. 

Give it a place beyond this one. Put it out, free yourself.
Once free, you will fly. Fly now. Say it: I don’t care. 

Eat better, sleep better, be more at rest while awake; make love
without overthinking. Stop fretting and say, I don’t care. 

You ask: but how should I push through the blood in the streets?
Dye your legs red and blend in with the surge. Say it: I don’t care.