Did I ever show you an aviary?
In this one there’s a small bench to sit on. Some craggy rocks. A black ibis. A stream. In looking at the ibis I recall your game room, and how you fashioned pyramids from blocks—red, yellow, blue. You’re too old for that now, though still little. In the stream some ducks swim. There’s a slight mist from above—I squint, trying to find the source, but find nothing. Did you know the inca tern can grow a moustache, son? I see an inca tern now, though this bird, pop-eyed, gray, has only the scantiest of whiskers. Do you know the blue spangled Cotinga, his Disneyland of pink and blue? There’s much wonder here but it’s incomplete, and I am traveling, alone, amid the bright and dark colors absent of you.
Heather Sager is an author of short fiction and poetry. Her recent work appears or is forthcoming in Painted Bride Quarterly, Heavy Feather Review, Mojave River Review, and other journals. She lives in Illinois.
–Art by DML
