Monday, June 22, 2009

The Executioner's Executioner Feels Sorry For The Moon

Yeah, and what’s it to you?

I wasn’t only watching porn. I was splitting my attention between the blonde girl on her stomach getting fucked from behind, and the flock of juncos taking their evening meal just out the window.

Her bleached Hollywood asshole was pointed skyward, looking like nothing poop had ever come out of.

Those brave little Passeriformes picked at the ground, the last meal of the day before the long January night would have them huddling in the underbrush, slowed in torpor, not feeling sorry for themselves.

I quit with the porn. Too cold to jerk-off, and uninspired anyhow. I stepped out back to feed the dogs, last meal of the day before I drive off this mountain, leaving them here in this safe house, lying in front of the warm fire, feeling sorry for themselves.

In the puppy’s eager little mouth was one of the juncos. “Drop it!”

I scooped the trembling bird off the ground. One wing hanging slack and twisted, no tail to speak of, one eye bulging and bloody. It was still alive, but no hope. I laid it on the wooden rail and picked up the hatchet from the kindling pile.

I couldn’t help but think that if you were an owl, or a hawk, or a human being, you would certainly be offered an attempt at saving. So why not you little junco? I don’t make the rules.

A soft thwunk! of the hatchet across the neck, just to break it. It stopped trembling. I threw the bird in the nearby brush and two things happened simultaneously, well actually three things.

The first: as the body flew towards the brush its head flipped casually off and landed a few feet in front of me.

The second: as the headless junco sailed into the thicket, a flock of roughly twenty living, still intact juncos flew out of it.

The third: Planet Earth kept right on tangoing with the sun, never missing a step.

The Dark-Eyed Junco has a black head, or hood, and is likened to an executioner in the birding world. I picked up the decapitated head by its beak. There was no blood, no change of expression, the cross-section was all feathers except for a tiny gristle of spine.

The executioner’s head.

I threw it as far as I could, and filled the dogs’ bowls with kibble.

As they began to eat I walked back inside, feeling sorry for the little bird who got chewed on for awhile before getting its head chopped off.

Feeling sorry for all the other birds who thought they were resting in safety before their mutilated friend flew unnaturally into the bush.

Feeling sorry for the cowardly dogs who would be left alone during the storm all night.

And yes, feeling sorry for myself, obviously.

The moon
stepped in for a dance
and was turned instantly to shadow.

January 2008
Lagunitas, CA

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