5/30/2011

2

A dry rattle in the pre-dawn dark: chipping sparrow. I lace up my boots, feeling for the eyelets like a clumsy reader of Braille.

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  1. A DRY RATTLE

    It’s the sparrow at break of dawn
    that gets me started like a dry
    rattle on my throat. Another day
    in these darkened streets should
    complete this test. How patient,
    Stick, can I remain? Another day
    and another dead body. Carrion
    of wrath descending, we wail.
    In Joplin, survivors have learned
    to lace their boots simply feeling
    for the eyelets, like fearful men
    who could only swear, before
    they walk through another day
    of groping for bodies who might
    still stir. Quite like clumsy readers
    of Braille, they won’t stop reading.

    —Albert B. Casuga
    05-30-11


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