Burial
greg kosmicki
Tonight as Briana and I sit to read
I smell dead animal odor
through the window on the breeze
so we go outside
to find
a dead pigeon,
gray and white
by the front window.
I pick it up with a spade
we carry it to the backyard
in amongst weeds
I haven’t mown for weeks
dig a shallow hole
put the bird
down among the roots
dirt and broken bricks
shovel dirt back over it.
No ceremony, just fact.
On the way to the backyard with the bird
we meet our neighbor Jim
who shrinks away in terror
explaining it’s just a phobia
a germ phobia of mine
suggests I wrap the bird
in one or two plastic bags
tells me of the link between
Legionnaire’s disease and pigeons
as I stand there holding this stinking bird
on the spade
says he found a rat
a few days ago his dogs chewed up
after following
his nose to the smell
says he threw it away far
over the fence behind the house
which is where
I was going with the bird.
He leaves for work, it’s evening
he has his deliveries to make.
We pause by the trash a while
while I think of putting the bird in there
but that seems likely to spread contagion
if the bird is sick
and Briana doesn’t think the idea
is right
she wants to throw it
out in back
for the ants
like I’d done with that sparrow
we found a month ago or so
I think we’ll bury it
and Briana will see the way
of all life, again, and the bird
will rot safely in the ground
where earth can do its sweet work
so we walk across the unmown back lawn
my mower broke weeks ago mowing grass in front of Jim’s
through grass and weeds almost as tall as her
and I dig a little round hole
two feet deep while she waits.
She says “There’s sticks in there Dad!”
so I tell her “They’re roots
of this hackberry tree here”
dig them out
drop the bird down into the hole
the bird catches in the roots
so I have to push it to the bottom
with the spade.
Nothing pretty.
The bird stinks so bad
it’s head
eaten off
where maggots crawl
I don’t feel ceremonious.
I scrape dirt back in
say “Now next Summer some flowers
will grow here,”
knowing that
to be a lie
for her benefit,
since only weeds
grow in this corner
a little type of creeper
that’s taken over half this yard
she says “Yeah! Flowers
will grow there tomorrow!”
“No, not tomorrow,
but next Summer, maybe.”
She corrects herself to say
“Flowers will grow here next Saturday.”
We leave it at that.
Back inside she goes back to the TV room
where we’d been reading
pulls two blankets over herself
laughs
“Daddy, Daddy!
I’m buried! I’m buried!”
“No, you’re covered up in blankets.”
giggles
“No, I’m not! I’m buried!
I’m buried! Daddy! I’m buried!”
For only a moment
I don’t know for sure
which one of us is right
then we get back in the chair
and finish our story.
