Best, Pet Bird

by Jesse Albatrosov

Our bird died without warning yesterday

I found him, slack mouthed, eyes parted

but unmoving, breast still beneath full feathers with toes

curled, as if gripping the perch outside as he always did on

warm days. The other bird was acting strange all day, I didn’t

investigate the unusual sounds or why I needed to retrieve him

only to return to a locked cage. Little Houdini, unexplainable

body sliding through spaces meant to imprison him.

My daughter cried out to me,

Mommy, I think Cheep Cheep is sick or tired.

He’s stared and stared at me until he needed to lie down.

I found the bird there, blue and white feathers sleek

against a hollow frame, an empty shell of bird,

the leftover pet suit we came to know as ours.

I didn’t mourn for this bird—its aching body

unable to speak out and say I am ailing,

molted feathers resting beneath it as if

its own unneeded extensions were always

purposeful—plucked and placed below for

when he decided to make a bed of them—

a blanket amongst seeds and stems of millet,

his boneyard of items waiting for a second purpose.

When I removed him from the cage, the other bird

squawked wildly, in grief or anger or protest,

his puffs of downward air created downy swirls

of plucked under-feathers, memories soon to be removed,

cage sanitized as a precaution. Animals say goodbye to

their mates and their friends in much simpler ways

than we do—singing their souls out of discarded

bodies, then singing to them in longing—

He was still warm when I moved and buried him, heat

permeated the towel as if to set fire to my maternal treason.

His friend hasn’t stopped singing his song, and I can imagine

what he’s saying. Little bird, old friend, looked

straight into the eyes of that girl and dropped dead.