Occasional reflection
of a child’s forgotten face
from grammar school
holds for a moment,
finds a name that sounds
like sweet innocence,
like trust and honesty
as it should be—like it
was in the beginning, before
the reasonable temptations—
the good and bad accidents
we shaped like horseshoes
into luck, believing
in something else.
Outside, I am reminded
of myself: red chested
finches on the rail
singing lust songs,
the clutch and tumble
of eagles from clouds
in a spring blue sky—
of that urgency
that consumed me
to pace the barbed wire.
We were told
that animals had no souls
worth saving, could not
think or reason like humans
to resist the lewd downcanyon
winds that were to stir us
like savages around a fire—
yet they have their place
in the front row
of my box of mirrors.
drycrikjournal 