I’m sitting on a kitchen chair watching
our neighborhood’s black squirrel
chase itself up the birch tree next door
when a bluebird
out of nowhere flies
into the window hard enough
to crack the glass.
That poor helpless bird
twitches in the back yard dirt, stunned.
The orange half-blind cat in here twitches, too.
Brian Beatty is the author of two recent poetry collections, Brazil, Indiana (Kelsay Books, 2017) and Coyotes I Couldn’t See (Red Bird Chapbooks, 2016). His writing has also been featured in public art projects and on public radio. He lives in St. Paul, Minnesota.