ODE TO THE GOD OF FRAYED WIRES

by Megan Merchant

High speed flash bird flight photo by R. W. Scott via Pinterest

How terrible it is to pretend
that god has a hand in it,

that he built windows into the river,

that the man I lay with is his image,
hums divine,

and that the smallest deaths
are trade-ups—

child-soldiers for his army,
collecting their milk-teeth in a jar.

I wake to the news of bombs,
and a flight of cardinals

from my window that sees
only miles into the world—

their red breasts choking the light.

I have to imagine that his hands
shook at the bomb’s final inspection,

frayed one of the wires, so that
it stunted, landing as an ache,

and not a shattering.

But also that he cursed the blessing
of foresight,

the all-knowing ruin
that no one saw coming,

soundless as a wintered sun.

Megan Merchant lives in the tall pines of Prescott, AZ. She is the author of two full-length poetry collections: Gravel Ghosts (Glass Lyre Press, 2016 Best Book Award), The Dark’s Humming (2015 Lyrebird Prize, Glass Lyre Press, 2017), four chapbooks, and a forthcoming children’s book with Philomel Books. She was awarded the 2016-2017 COG Literary Award, judged by Juan Felipe Herrera, the Poet Laureate of the United States.

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