SONG BIRD & BEEF BONE Poem by Lisa Allen Ortiz

Bird perches in the strings of flesh
and sings of the dead.
What we all do.
Same day I heard the story about the boy.
Same day the weather changed,
dark clouds all along the ridge.
Where they found the boy. Not that
before I thought the world was good.
The bird perches on the blood-tinted stump
in the grass, what's left.
Pinkish feathers of his chest.
What can we do but watch.
Knowing what we do.
The bird devoured all he could.