Bluesky

When I was a child I was terrifiedof the space between One and Zero

vast as the ages before my birthstrait as my death—late at night

I heard my parents arguinglovingly in their locked room,

the angora cat coming homewith a sparrow in her mouth,

and the raindrops on the shinglescounting themselves—how to sleep,

how to cross the empty placebetween the name “sparrow”

and that limp thing crying,adamant, creating me with its cry