I.

I should give the robin a proper burial given the season,
rather the month, of my grandfather’s death.
I was told there’s a theory that describes different types of remembering.
What harvests my memory: the city wearing the horizon
like a rash. I open the backdoor to a wooden porch, patch
of green on concrete. Something outside wants this to be easy.
Instead of scouting the source, I toss the bird into the yard, sweep dust
into the corner. I’m repressing.
Two dreams ago, my grandfather was an animal paralyzed
in a field. It’s been years, this beast. A friend asks if I had time
to name the bird, what would it be. My answer: Not yet.

II.

Behind the robin, a scatter of weeds—dandelions, daisies, thistles—
my father thirsts to uproot. The grass around is stale-yellow.
The sky carries gray. When I touch the bird, my fingertip digs,
disappears is—never mind.
About being broken, the fence with a small hole in the middle.
The chronic problem with openness is where. What enters:
a wind, a lament that forces surrender
over the bird.
It doesn’t rain—of all the seasons, not this.
I hear a siren chime, fade. My father screams my name
from the window, but the window is closed.

III.

How many times have I seen the dead robin between gravel, greenery,
and the ugly stains left by midnight’s storm? Every angle captures
darkness. Where the scarlet belly avails the disrobed feathers, a tiny fist-
sized hole.
I can forge many things: my love for overcast, patterns, nostalgia
for my grandfather.
What if, instead of “bury,” we say “decorate”?
Isn’t that graceful—the tongue dabbing the roof to feel favored?
I know it’s inconsiderate of me to muscle beauty into everything.
I don’t speak when I decorate the bird with my shoe and dirt.
What I mean is, there once was a robin.

Luther Hughes is a Seattle native and author of Touched (Sibling Rivalry Press, 2018). He is the Founding Editor of The Shade Journal and Executive Editor for the The Offing. His work has been published or is forthcoming in Poetry, New England Review, TriQuarterly, Washington Square Review, and others. Luther received his MFA from Washington University in St. Louis. You can follow him on Twitter @lutherxhughes. He thinks you are beautiful.

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