CHIRP

Maybe first we’ll poke our heads out

and see if anyone else is poking their heads

out. Birds lifting their beaks over the lip

of the nest. Pry our eyes open in the sun.

Look left and right. And ahead at the house

across the street where Ms.Hawkins lived

before a while back when I don’t want

to talk about it. Maybe we won’t want

to talk about it. Or read about it.

Or dream about it. Or sing about it.

Like a baby unable to recall birth,

like a spirit unable to tell us what

dying is like. Maybe we will feel strangely

cleansed, but not enough to shake hands

but enough to smile at the neighbors

that bother us. Enough to laugh at the jagged

hedges that have grown unruly around the doorway

of our faces. Maybe we will listen to the party being

had before the party we inevitably throw,

the birds lifting their beaks over the lip

of the nest, chirping new, after pecking through eggshell.