Where Are The Sparrows?
at Nah Am Wasser,
whose name I finally got
after four years living in Berlin,
sitting out amid March
with just a little sun, taking
what I can get, with two
sweat shirts and a jacket on,
I finish a slice of strawberry
rhubarb pie and push the plate
full of crumbs to the other side
of the table
but no sparrows fly down and land
like they did at the end of Summer
last year, pecking and pecking.
now that we live in an age
where everything feels unstable,
the thought occurs
that perhaps they will never return,
that this was the Winter
when the natural order crossed
the threshold into death,
that the fuse finally ran out,
and the extinction of a certain species
of worms caused a chain of murder,
that made a tree not produce nuts,
which in turn made the tiny sparrows
in the bushes shiver as they sang
their last song and don’t you know it
we’re next.
finally there is a crow
cawing as the sun slips into the pocket
of clouds. once I was a vegetarian
for godsakes but no longer.