To A Crow, Shifting Through Suburban Trash Poem by Talisha Hetrick

They call you death.
Death, like you're some kind of disease;
A weeper, a deciever, a dirty habit not yet kicked.
Is there nothing out there better for you, grander for you,
my burnt-faced friend?
Four shining fragments of a plastic bag hang from your noble beak,
melded shut like an iron frame.
In the corn, you were king.
Straw men with their miserable pitchforks couldn't keep from the earth.
In the forest, your flight was powerful, the echo of your laughter was a scythe.
But in the dark of a trash can, there is no sparkle or shine.
So why are you here?