I meet the birds on theirterrain, the gray of.Chimney swifts smudged, siftedfrom clouds like featheredcinders, all is blurred orwisps of smoke, an attendance.We watch from the roofof Birmingham’s tallest building& I imagine a flight withoutknowledge of falling.It may be spring. It may bewind warming a given name.It may be trapped inside[naturalized] this thingI wanted, a motion down-ward, a foot driving stacksof sustained Ds over a piano,the arms of Rilke’s terribleangels. Even the holy cannotbe loyal to three flagswithin Thee. I am severaled,torn from my mother’s tongue,a world keeps calling wings wrong.Once I ran through high grassto greet a scarecrow, my handsholding a skirt aloft. Now,building, let me go. Osky, make me stop.