Here, where men's eyes were empty and as bright
As the blank windows set in glaring brick,
When the wind strengthens from the sea -- and night
Drops like a fog and makes the breath come thick;

By the deserted paths, the vacant halls,
One may see figures, twisted shades and lean,
Like the mad shapes that crawl an Indian screen,
Or paunchy smears you find on prison walls.

Turn the **** gently! There's the Thumbless Man,
Still weaving glass and silk into a dream,
Although the wall shows through him -- and the Khan
Journeys Cathay beside a paper stream.

A Rabbit Woman chitters by the door --
-- Chilly the grave-smell comes from the turned sod --
Come -- lift the curtain -- and be cold before
The silence of the eight men who were God!

THERE was a high majestic fooling
Day before yesterday in the yellow corn.

And day after to-morrow in the yellow corn
There will be high majestic fooling.

The ears ripen in late summer
And come on with a conquering laughter,
Come on with a high and conquering laughter.

The long-tailed blackbirds are hoarse.
One of the smaller blackbirds chitters on a stalk
And a spot of red is on its shoulder
And I never heard its name in my life.

Some of the ears are bursting.
A white juice works inside.
Cornsilk creeps in the end and dangles in the wind.
Always-I never knew it any other way-
The wind and the corn talk things over together.
And the rain and the corn and the sun and the corn
Talk things over together.

Over the road is the farmhouse.
The siding is white and a green blind is slung loose.
It will not be fixed till the corn is husked.
The farmer and his wife talk things over together.

The body
rolls up in its silver coffin limousine
into the sun-baked empty lot between
the hardware store and the old clinic.
Tin pans glisten in the late August heat.
The crowd chitters amicably to itself
until at last someone lifts the lid
       and eats.
Paper plates soak
in the back of a pickup truck
and sweet tea sweats through the long
                             Carolina afternoon.

Someone's singing chills through your home
Whispers, chitters, cackles and chatters
Loved ones, old ones, one hundred beloved's
Strangers get stranger, stay longer, get stronger until they're gone.
Someone's yelling breaths from your walls
And it isn't you or me.

The little chitters of charged words crying like a chorus line,
whose notes echo off chimes of crystal.

The shakes and jitters of hot nerves dying,
with eyes homing in like a missile.

Tiny critters curled up tight in their respective chrysalides,
awaiting the day they sprout wings.

My current state of mind is electrified,
but oh how the body sings.

Ghosts splash about
on the ice house wall,
beer chitters in the jar,
stories are told in fits and gnarls.

The moon is a bleached breast
in its brassiere of dappled smoke,
up above the cracked wet wire
in the driftwood garden curl.

In a slant, we all watch
a woman across the alley
in her blue dress, scanning
her hands for news of the heart.

In the near square, a thin man
is also a plume, standing shirtless
on his crystal wash of balcony.
The street sings: sea static.

All these people walk blithely by
as rain and steam take turns
on the roulette wheel.
I feel the weight of my interior,

I feel the limit of skin, the world
that ends there. I'm not sure
I belong here at the gathered table:
I'm a reflected photo negative.

Leaves spiral overhead
as the green-bedded steps
rise up in blotches to meet me.  
Loaves of clouds hunt and burst.

Whatever is behind me
presses me forward;
but whatever is ahead
pushes me back.

Chitters, shivered chatting teeth pitter-pattered when the heater had burned out last night.

So, I covered myself in my blanket and brewed hot tea, but it's only lasted an hour or two.

Or three or four hours at most,
but before I knew it, the sun showed up and sparkled.

Light beams brewed out of me and my coffee cup,
and before I knew it, I had breakfast loaded in my belly,

and a tote bag full of new stories to share all of my
hung over friends after our brutally long
weekend covered with ***** and losers.

KRRRT-chack! (Old One-Eye snaps his beak, wings puffed.)

CHREEE-Kaa! (Young Tailflick lands beside him, tilting her head.)

Old One-Eye: Krrt-chack! Krrt-chack!
A warning: sky-fox (hawk) nearby. Sharp wing. Fast death. Stay low.

Tailflick: CHREE! Chree-ka-ka-ka-KA!
Disbelief. Bravado. She flew near it. Stole a beetle mid-glide. No fear.

Two-Wing-Drum: DRRRRR-kak-kak-kak! (Wings slapping trunk.)
Challenge. Boast. He saw her. Beetle was already dead. Empty glory.

Tailflick: Ka-KA-KA-krrrrrp!
Insult. Two-Wing eats rotten fruit. Mind like snail. Beak like old bark.

Chirpette (a tiny, newly-fledged thing): tzeep-tzeep-tzee?
Confusion. What is “death?” What is “hawk?” Can you eat it?

Old One-Eye: GRAWWWK. (Low, guttural.)
Silence. Night is coming. Time for truth, not noise.

(All birds still. Then, slowly, a rattling murmur builds—)

All Together: chrr-chrr-CHAAA, kr-kr-ka-KAW, chreeeee-CHACK, tzzzzrr!
The Sharing begins. Gossip. Echoes. Stolen things.

Bent-Beak: chack-chack. Chack.
He found shine. Blue-glass-circle. Deep hole near water.

Three-Toe: Krrreeek! KA-ka-ka!
Jealous. He saw it first. Bent-Beak just louder.

Tailflick: cheeeeeeee. (Slow, high pitch.)
Dream. She flew so high her wings turned to cloud. Chased stars. Bit the moon.

Old One-Eye: KRRRRAW-CHAK.
Reminder. Dreamers fly crooked. Sky is not gift. Sky is blade.

(Wind rustles. A squirrel chitters nearby. All heads snap in unison.)

Chirpette: tzee?
Can we eat it?

All Together: KAW-KAW-KAW-KAW! (A terrible cacophony of agreement.)

No one flies. Just noise. Noise is hunt. Noise is dance. Noise is magpie. Twelve dark shapes tuck heads into wings. One eye each on the moon. Still dreaming of shine.