Don't Name Them

Oh, sacrificial birds 
whatever makes you beautiful.
Don’t name them 
for they will go 
pale-combed and blue-cheeked,
lights out, golden blinks 
to frozen flight.
Here, she lies.

And when they die in January
you will not be able to part
the Earth. No one will 
receive them
and they can never be 
warm and peckish again. 

It is practice.
The quiet friendship 
of a beaked bosom. 
Such solace in loving against 
the clamor of children.
That bottomless tumbling 
inside
and gone.

I know to bathe my pets 
before they pass.
That God, he
whispers dignities into my ears and
I do my best to 
wash away my shortcomings. 

Sorry, I’m not a
more natural 
mother. Sorry, it’s harder 
than it should be. 
Of course, she had
A Name.