Newsprint

A., look at the heights
of this goose flesh,
the clamorous feathers
flared broadly and froze
up as though by ice,
quills erect as scared
soldiers. Let me be your
peacock while the sun
still leeches in the glass.
Gun and fold these
interminable mounds.
Find I’ve not an egg
to boil (not a head
to mount on your wall),
just this slush, this mire,
these screams slumping
across a pale limp page.
Wince your dreaming day
through and molt the old
maxim to sleep on it. Sleep
on the lost plumage and eye
a future in leather and wool,
quivering, ready to pluck.