Intercession

Do concerned birds see everything
we can’t? Like a low-flying starling

starved in winter, I peck holes of daylight
into night’s half-frozen dirt, refusing

to excuse that I failed to punch through
clouds, pluck my son before his feet flew

off the skateboard—back arched in the air.
And what of the tree-tops: did they cavern

his screams into the wind’s sail, or catch
his face—the shock, plummeting

out of boyhood—mouth half-open
to the sun? If I tell you what I saw hours

later in his eyes, when he whispered,
“I don’t want to die,” if I tell you how close

the sky came to settling beneath him
would you believe in trumpets, tired angels,

sword-snapping dragons crowding the moon?
When the surgeon told my son he’d lost

a patient weeks earlier—same accident
same age—I watched their mirrored faces,

drops of clear shrapnel singing their cheek-skin.
I saw streaming and surrender, too, like the flock

of swans outside the hospital window—necks
bent from battle—frayed feathers cushioning

gravel-snow below. I saw what the birds saw
weeks earlier—same accident, same age, no angel.