Bird Men

There are no portals, and little wisdom.

Men jump from balconies with best wishes

for those below, hitting the sidewalk asleep

and dreaming of remote perches. They grip

metal rungs and arch backs in practice,

perfecting their pre-flight posture

in anticipation of the plummet. Trinkets

fall out of coat pockets, cell phones trill

on belts tightened against the leathered morning,

and handkerchiefs billow in the wind.

Wallets drained of bills strain against buttock-seams

and the cries of the birds sound quietly:

men stretch arms into grotesque wingspans,

thoughts of husbandry and fatherhood aloft

for a moment, then hitting earth with a thud,

cast off like dead plumage. Like crows who fly

from barren nests in search of gallows on which

to rest, or cardinals that shed vermilion atop

the corpses of brethren, men balance on railings

and teeter there, unsure of their flight paths through

this estuary of city skyline, this stasis precipice.

~ ~ Shane Neilson