I find this morning free of feathers,
A bird in blue cloth and tethers
Flightless now she recalls the air,
Every breath whistling the leaf-shorn limbs
She wears baggy hats, shuffling, shedding,
Her feathers like leaves,
Left alone by the wind
For with loft left without.
She draws them fine and brusque flowers,
On every flat board in her house.
She is below orion at night and the hawks at midday
Above the needy nettles and the unruly ferns
She is diligent in her ardors, belligerent in the arbors and the bells
Which call forth the dusk into evening.
She lifts her voice in the shining call of the altar,
Where she like other birds,
Reaches out her neck for torn bread
Asks for her hair back and her father.