Joan Miro's Person Throwing a Stone at a Bird

by John Brantingham

Miro’s person, (let’s call him a child),
(let’s call him a boy), his eye stares
with the horror of the moment after
the rock has been thrown and that wild
flash before it hits the turkey, and nothing
will be as it was. It’s the boy’s shock
that nature has given him the power to take
life from the bird, to take it from anything.
The bird who probably sees it coming,
who probably knows how this will end,
who probably understood the fate of all birds,
waits without fear, without complaining.
He waits for the unjust universe to extend
its black finger, to touch him, mutter its word.