The Offering

THE OFFERING

He sat, silently smirking over
his cardboard cup of coffee,
leaning, to lap it like a cat.

Lips oiled and curved and bluish,
hands knotted with filth, he
stroked his pocket.

Like a child picking wildflowers -
he paid court to every set of eyes
in the busy hum of the fast-food
place.

He chose me and pinned me to
his moment in time.
Lascivious, leering, laughing,
he opened his pocket just for me.

A half-dead sparrow leaked
part way out and burred its
broken wing.

It sang as sweetly as if we were
in a glen, a meadow, a dale of
heliotropic sunflowers
.

Then he licked one lip and
ran his bony, bent finger down
the bird's spine, causing it
to flutter, as if some phantom
wind blew by...

He put it back, that broken bird.
His eyes dared me to commit to
him in an obscene partnership
of silence. I smeared myself
with his evil...said no word.

Then I walked to him, held
out my hand, and after grinning
madly, he took the bird from
his pocket and laid it on my palm.