Ornithology tells us the tail gives her away.
Neither type nor genus, no name of species,
nor tree of life can protect her here.
She’s built for spruce and pine not here.
Not this room.
She’s made for bottom boughs, burrs and branches,
winter rust, dead leaves. Needles.
She’s made for Birney or Al Purdy, Don McKay
in Sutton Township where she hides her feathers
by dim of dusk, din of fear, fibre-fastened
to the ground.
She’s broad shouldered and barometer.
She’s Ted Hughes.
She’s wings won’t lift. Wants lift. Wants wide,
wide berth.
She’s what won’t leave without a flight plan.
Antony Di Nardo is the author of Alien, Correspondent (Brick Books) and Soul on Standby (Exile). His next collection with Brick, Roaming Charges, is forthcoming in 2015. His poetry appears widely in Canadian journals and internationally. He divides his time between Sutton, Quebec and Beirut, Lebanon where he teaches at International College.