winning feels like death for bird
she picks it up with her ageing limbs
this thing she devoted herself to
dragged through the night, nursed
when it was ill, kept awake when
it was shaking, sober, mad. bird
sheltered it, swaddled it like a
dying baby and held it until the
tiny little eyelids popped open
until it cried. pace yourself,
bird says to herself when she's
tired. she's always tired, covered
by two thick veils that remove
her from the light. today bird is
shimmering because she's wet
and afraid and touching small
heavens on her way back through
the sky after a long drive north
through dead air. bird was tipped
over by a warning, it came from
some grim other that feeds itself
on bird. she knows, she knows
she always knew. bird can see you
through your binoculars
your thick eyelids, drooping
are you even watching? bird is
pirouetting across the sun, burning
her wings on the hot, bright edge of
nothing. bird notices it: the way the light
catches her plume and pulls it
in, melting her body down into
a tiny nub of glass, opalescent
and worn, aged like a prisoner
who never stops losing. and yes,
bird knows that the right way is up
and that her body, in this form or not
is still the same thing that it was
but even so she'll say she can't
feel it, even as it extends
its distractions, spinning her
face around and around and around
until bird is nothing like a
small flighted body, only a
sad, distant memory, dying alone
under a shrivelled, black sun