an ode to the taste of stars

the grass in the parking lot behind our building
is strewn with wrappers & cigarette butts & 
the innards of a cassette & bottle caps &
a smashed clear bottle. at night the children come out
to pick through the knotted scalp. they're building 
nests in the tired thin trees. they have kicked out
the birds. they have invented feathers. they are
roosting with their friends & hanging their hula-hoops
from the branches as evidence that this is where
they'll thrive. i sit on the stoop to watch them.
i bring binoculars though they are only a few feet
away. i peer & they tell me to join them. i don't know
if they mean that i am also a neighborhood child 
or if they think i'm an adult who should spin himself
backwards. i take a handful of scraggled cassette tape
& a few shards of glass. i ask them to help me
arrange these scraps into a nest & they flutter down
like angels or doves. they give me my own branch
& ask me what i'm going to be when i lose my 
feathers. i have feathers like those of a pigeon.
i told someone not too long ago that i think
pigeons are spiritual animals. they laughed & i said
no really have you see their different patterns?
green shine reflecting moonlight. the neighborhood children
help me into a tree. we pluck stars & share them
because they're never in season here. they're are shy
& few. they are mostly sour but occasionally &
surprisingly sweet. a boy with a glass crown is best
at catching them. the fruit buzzes as if we're eating
those thick houseflies. i had always wondered
who was laughing all through the night & it was me
i was laughing & the children were laughing
& i was supposed to be there too instead of my room
where i shut the door & told the darkness
to make me into a real human. i want nothing
to do with that. i want night. i want the branches.
i want to spit feathers at headlights & shoo 
the wolves away from town when they skulk by
& remind us why we sleep in trees.