I picked up the fallen chick
like a fragile figurine, glass-
blown & pink as flesh,
toted its small breast,
downy head, broken wing

into the house where my mother
in her apron, spoon in hand,
turned from the pot of broth
boiling on the stove
to see this helpless thing

& me, carrying it,
cradling it in the hollow
of my palm like a precious word
or the prayer I spoke one summer,
asking the giver of my life to save this one.

From Full Worm Moon (Cascade Books, 2018).
This poem first appeared in Rock & Sling.
Used here with the author’s permission.