bird closet

keeping all my feathers for tuesday.
i put on my beak to pluck the worms
from the harpsichord. have you never seen
a bird with the legs of a girl?
in college everyone had a love poem.
mine screamed until i killed it
with a thumb tac. pressed the body
into the wall. some people walk around
& don't even know how easy they have it.
no migration to take each year 
in search of an impulse. i tell my invisible therapist
"i'm doing it again" & by "it" i mean everything.
i mean filling the closet with birds
& telling everyone they are just props.
buying chess boards & calling
random phone numbers. when someone 
picks up saying, "i have been waiting
to talk to you for years" & seeing
who they think i am. don't we all
want to be who someone is waiting for?
i lock myself in the bird closet. they birds
dream of merciless weekends. they dream
of throwing axes at the moon. 
they beg for a flashlight so they can do
shadow puppets. i curl into an egg.
listen to my own yolk 
as it sings. walking around my house
in only a thong i realize the windows 
& wide open. someone has me
as their science fair project. an ra knocks
on my door room door & barges in.
there is no privacy in being an egg.
he points to the covered smoke detector
& says "that's going to be 200$."
the birds in the closet yell at me or him.
i would do anything to never disappoint. 
an intervention causes me to let them go.
one at a time. i don't want my friends to know
they've talked me out of my lovely mania.
one bird out the window. one bird 
set free by the river. another in the library.
another in my backpack. one. just one left.
inside the closet. i bring him churros 
& lollipops. he weeps. i tell him 
he is not really alone. i am here.