Crows   I think about her pain, the way it settles on her spine like crows, at first just one, carelessly crashing in, never quite gets comfortable and pretty soon the second one flaps in as if to piss the first one off, and they’re squawking Fuck you! and Fuck you, too! at each other, they never get enough of that, it’s all hello in crow, and two crows are nothing — soon the whole goddamn flock is there with their endless complaints, insane betrayals, grudges. If I throw a rock at them, will they just go? That kind of pain.                                                    for my mother     © Michael Fleming Brattleboro, Vermont May 2012