bird bath 

if i were a better poet i would
tell you the truth. i know we're all
past wanting that though. i used to have
a bird bath in my bedroom. i left my window
open to the world. first it was just chickadees
& wrens who came. then larger & larger birds.
a hawk & a vulture. then the impossible birds.
the pterodactyls & boys. my father lives now
in my childhood bedroom & i don't know
if there is still a bird bath. i hope there is
for his sake. who or what
does he invite? we have always been
the same. prone to secrets. collectors.
rocks & feathers & exoskeletons. yesterday
at an intersection in my hometown
i saw a person i used to know. he was driving.
or maybe he wasn't. i have invented him
places before. in new york, once i  thought i could
run into another boy who lived there. one in
millions. we are not as rare as we would like
to think. the orbits that run us. then there was
a bird bath again & the boy was in the bath
& i was weeping. i remember so little 
about him now. i keep boys like rosary beads.
my thumb runs over them always 
in the hopes of getting away. i have never
washed myself there, instead, i've always let
the baths be for other creatures. 
when i got home i thought about his car.
a burnt orange. i thought about the chickadees
& how they kept me company when i was dying.
there is never enough water to wash away
what you do not want to remember.
this is not the ritual of the birds. i ask them
what what they bring to the water 
& they say, "this is not water." i do not know
what they mean. i have driven to the ocean.
found a parking spot & walked out
to the big bird bath. the gulls turning
into boys. the boy driving away. his long fingers
curled around the steering wheel 
as if it were a wrist.