new poem

“Osprey”

I woke up belly-down in Osprey, spun-out
and swollen near a Salvation Army.
The sky was bloated with clouds
of automotive injury. In the distance,
a siren cried like a baby, drowning
the ringing in my right ear. I could see
the accident clearly from the vacant lot
where my body lay heavy, surrounded
by soggy garbage. There was blood on
the gravel, and a uniformed man with
a Senator's stature overseeing
the stretchers.

Soon, my thoughts were unlucky
creatures waiting to be slaughtered.
I remembered a night in Wisconsin,
wandering naked through the snow, four
years old, my mother finding me frostbitten
before calling an ambulance. I remembered
my face full of liquid morphine.