Wednesday Morning in May

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The golf-ball-sized snails look like they're flying
across the aquarium glass. The caged canary trills
and works an off-center melodic arpeggio.

The parakeet loves everyone together, and it's best
if there's laughing. I'm not sure if the yellow fish
understand laughing but they can hear and know
a few kinds of things. The nightingale dives onto a slice
of Jonagold apple. The snails have parked at the top
of the tank, extending their breathing tubes to fill
their one lung, as we listen to radio news, blowback
in Iraq, corporations now suit-wearing heathen tribes
a few years after their slick invasion.

Garbage guys working their way along 53rd,
their fossil fuels revving up then calming,
revving up, then quieting. I don't know if they vote
for their best interests. The fish are resting
in the weight of water on all sides, as the snails
are back exploring what might feel forever
like a new terrain. They look happy
when they launch out, their lipless
mouths opening and shutting, their antennae
waving as if they were flying. Now the canary
has piped up his scales, making his music
swirl in from behind our bodies, to pull us
into the light he sings directly part of,
the medium where we conjoin.