underwater city

It’s spring. The sparrow dies instantly. Quick 
bang, the streetcar suspended. Small black 
body. You can still see white, speckled, small 
grains of rice across the back, twittering youth. 
You insist on a proper burial. Together we glide 
through the city, bird cupped in our palms. The 
concrete, post-rain, bleak and lunar. We speak 
elliptically, sleep-talk about death, wings 
immobilized in flight. The air thickens, we 
breathe out. Our hulls contain us, solemn as 
prayer, our delicate shells of bone . . .

Published in TOK: Writing the New Toronto, Book 5. Purchase the book to read the full piece.