Partial hospitalization

Liliana Bernardo a cantar "Often a Bird"

The bird I drew

much larger

than it should have been because it lived

inside me: purple head, blue neck, green belly

bright orange tail.

Imagine a dinosaur living

inside your breast beating

like a heart

where your heart should be—I forgot

the wings. I promised I wouldn’t think

of birds, of what hollowed

my chest, of what I tried to let loose through the small doors

of my wrists.

I promised no new doors

into my body.

I promised a body free

of fossils buried

in the bone like the rings

of a tree,

like —

Look

it got away from me:

the bird,

the dinosaur.

The bird’s cloaca: an opening in the body to expel

waste, eggs, sperm

Imagine your chest full of waste beating like a wave

all over itself.

Not waste but wings

The bird painted with chalk.

The background muddled blue and green and gray.

The background ugly so the bird might fly.

Donika Kelly