Part of the Beast by Brad Liening

from Part of the Beast

All these dead birds
What are we going to do with them all
Shovel them like snow to the edges of the parking lot
Great gray and brown feathery drifts
Spilling and feathering out again at the edges
Occasionally a cardinal like a splotch of bright blood
Among all the undifferentiated
Dead birds there’s so many
They ruffle and tumble in the wind
And there are fewer spaces now for parking
Where do we park among the dead birds
It used to be bees now it’s birds also maybe still bees
All these dead birds they weigh almost nothing
So why does my back hurt



from Part of the Beast

The latest invasive species isn’t so bad
Spiders the size of sedans
Webs big as apartment buildings
Like sharks they’ll eat the occasional person
But mostly it’s a case of mistaken identity
Mostly when we are drunk and surly
Throwing rocks
Enamored with our broken hearts
Lamenting a future we had failed to adequately imagine
Now it’s too late
There’s no getting rid of these spiders and in the sun
Their resting bodies look like dreams incarnated from brains
More gentle and loving than ours






Brad Liening is a poet living in Minneapolis and at bradliening.blogspot.com.