John D. Fry

Oneiromancy, Late Afternoon

there is a little boy

with a bird
for a heart

looking out the window

no longer in the shape
of an ache within the man
I am becoming, have

become: he

who, hard as he tries
like all hell!
to hold onto

(hope)

still sees the end of a world

(he was just a boy
when it darkened)

every sunset a dusk fresh

slit wrist of October

sky rivering incarnadine

& the boy’s small sparrow
an owl now
a whippoorwill then
a hawk

until, again, a heart

wanting to fly into

what?—I no longer remember

why—so I ask the boy

I had been once
in my reverie room
looking out the window to

ask the heart
who was also a bird

why the light
fading, still
sometimes feels like dying

                                                       I know you won’t
believe me: I can feel it

as word to wound
like hurt, like heart

I can feel it streaming through
where bone broke easily
as a wish in my right wing

                                                       but you probably don’t
believe me, said the bird
nesting in the boy, because

if you think
you can

feel the fell
of day

falling inside
your body

you must be
dreaming—

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