I would like to tell you that now
I am happy. But I am not.
I only can tell you that again,
a cardinal visited, spiky headed
and pale from summer,
that it looked inside and saw
the withering of me, how too often
lately, heat from a cruel noon
has bleached me, suctioning from face
and limb essentials like suppleness,
nutrients, and will. I would mourn
except even that has been extracted,
absorbed where I cannot follow,
somewhere between the cardinal's thin
and open wing and the rest of its mortal
body, that space between the space,
through which only breath may pass.
Katherine Mercurio Gotthardt, copyright June 14, 2024, all rights reserved
Posted in Katherine's Coffeehouse
