Читать книгу Oceanic - Aimee Nezhukumatathil - Страница 10

The Origin of Feathers on My Windshield

The pelicans dip their brilliant sloppy bills

into their tired shoulders and there is a certain bridge

in Florida where you have to be careful not to hit them

as they fly across windshields. I lost the only picture

of me taken by a man who used to be the boy I loved

when I was fifteen. When this man last visited me,

all the pretty rivers in town were tannin-stained

from a certain oak-and-chestnut mess. We walked

carefully through glass galleries and a little bakery

that sold a single gold-dipped strawberry. I was the girl

whose hands gave up chewing through a dahlia long ago.

Even he has crawled too far across soil to turn back now.

And truth be told, so have I. I am like a man who prefers

the taste of his own tongue instead of the lips of summer.

My shadow and the shadow of sunflowers are the same.