A nightbird takes my heart
to a pine-tree's lofty branch
and puts it in the nest,
and waits for it to hatch.

If I don't climb the pine-tree now
the shell of my heart will crack
and the hatched bird will never fly low
enough to be caught and brought back.

I sigh, afraid to go up,
as the amber fingers of stars
pull the violet sky through the gap
in my chest, like a scarf of moth-eaten challis.