tell me brother, now? can you feel them?
with your mornings sooner
praying for death, from dawn
the rent not controlled by your lords
but a distant mystics throes
in your open hand small pebbles and stones
reward or wage salvaged from soiled bones
and moments bask at the glory
your labors wage for the week
until the magpies and merchants
and their feathery speech
leave your palm empty
with no stones to eat

tell me brother, now? can you hear them?
these fat, raucous foul
fat laughing, cawing nasty birds
come with me brother
before they pick us clean
let us boil and pluck, grow fat on
their meat
and only be sated when
their bones pick our teeth
and when we emerge, not fat
birds we'll be, but men
of heaven and earth
mountain and street