This piece was first published in Quarto’s 2020 Spring Print Edition.
Illustration by Gisela Levy
In Audubon Eastern Landbirds 1946,
there is a photograph of a bird I ran over
in an empty parking lot.
From God’s mouth
drops the commandment
grow from nothing.
From His hands
drops the apple,
which tastes different at night
when knowledge is unwanted.
His attention to detail
is shown in the nervous system of a bird
splayed out something like a garden.
Sorrow,
bright as silver dollar,
blossoms under the skin.
No one mentions the obvious:
that of course bodies will be
left,
that I will one day marvel at
how slow this leaving can be.
The heavy sunlight writhing
in idle cars—
the light which doesn’t announce itself
as light—
tastes different
over carnage.