Birds, Breaks

The branches tattooed on your arms
are a springboard from which you can launch:

Propelled somehow from your own skin -
Freed from cartilage to conquer the air.

A Kingfisher neck on marrowless bones

Daring the tide of the sweet Thames and
Kicking out against the brown sprawl beyond.

Your majesty a protest against
Gracelessness, gravity, containment.

Your beautiful dance; broken-up, hysterical dance,
Just fragments, stored up and shored against your ruin.