big white bird on lapping water
grey-winged in mussed labyrinth
cattails, bent reeds battered
by the claws and wounded flight
of seagull speckled
or drunk fisherman
through the shore's failing net
of stunned vegetation, long boots
rubber in the living world

birdcalls interpenetrate across
force-field of hospital windows
the memory-lost in meek robes
staring out at their spirits
robbed and shrunk in the lightweight
breastplates, carriers of the old
blood world into the new blood new,
networks failing, sinews snap
out past the lawn legs too slow
to drown emperor head,

underarms of the wings thinking
forks of branch moaning bodies
believe they carry the core;
hydraulics remove the center upwards,
bright world outside pill-stained
window goes on without a brain, memory