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Stick, Stock, Stone, Dead
by Kate Grimes Growing up, we were birds. My mother cradled my sister, the owlet, to her downy breast. As she became got stronger, she crawled up to nest in Mother’s hair. Then we were ordinary children, in time to enter school. We wore thick socks and ate sandwiches cut into triangles. It was my sister’s idea to pretend the couch was a ship on the ocean. It was my idea to stock the cushions with limes. I was the first to return to bird form, following a devastating bout of pneumonia. I awoke, congested no longer, lighter than air. I looked something like a canary, only pinkish. There was nothing to be done. My sister was crushed. I sat on her finger, tried to tell her that a change such as this was cruel and necessary as a new tooth. By necessity, we communicated through song. Unless she becomes owlish once more, she is destined to outlive me and cup my beloved hollow bones in her palm. I sip puddles and try to remember what soup is like. With each pebble I taste I wonder what to feel. |
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