The Hawk Kitchen Outpost 4:05pm
Tonight We’re having a dinner party
for My Two Children
My Daughter’s Boyfriend
and a tree-planting friend
I haven’t met.
The Table is set
with Silver and a new package
of steak knives.
I am wearing a new top
bought with Eliza in Yarmouth —
it’s the colour
of Chamomile Tea
drunk from one surviving mug
of My Grandmother’s
served for My Tea
with milk and sugar
after ballet lessons
The Hawk Queen Bed 8:54am
I could write It now
while My Husband is in The Tub —
It’s all set up
in the heart of the USA —
The World’s Largest Slaughter House
when The Aliens decide to eat Us
They could herd Us along
the metal gates
the miles of trucking routes
in packed containers
to The Killing Chambers
where We would slide
down against steel floors
compressed
maybe 50 at a time
and dumped out onto The Cutting Boards
sliced
strung
savored
The Hawk Dining Room 9:45am
Last Night I stayed up
with Eliza to watch
a food production documentary
about the over-crowding
of chickens and cows
and pigs herded
into killing chambers
designed by humans to do just that —
having The Life
squeezed out
of half a dozen pigs
at a time —
I got one hour of sleep
and My Daughter refused
to have coffee with me
The Hawk Front Yard 10:20am
I have a rose bush
planted for a life
of the sibling to My Children
never seen except
encased by an ultra-sound screen
when He/She was declared
too small
and I had to wait a week
The Hawk Queen Bed 9:11pm
“It’s a shame She has no insight,”
said a psychiatric nurse to My Husband
one of those 23 years
when I was drugged
for the duration
of The Prime of My Life —
well today I have more “insight”
than all the staff and doctors
put together
and I got to have a manicure
in the company of My Daughter
attended by an eager Asian
named Cong Lee
Who asked Me
where We’d been shopping
The Hawk Queen Bed 8:17am
Once I had a pretty coat —
the last time I wore it was to see
Our Lawyer from The Hyde Inquiry —
it was flared with a high-cut waist
and Two Silver Buttons
but I gave it away
years ago
to The Salvation Army
when I got rid of My Black Jesus Clothes —
this morning I woke with an anxious thought
regretting My Disposal
but My Comforting Husband
tried to reassure Me:
“It was the drugs.”
The Hawk Queen Bed 7:55am
I want to write about the big spider web
wet, I saw this morning
at My Kitchen Window — with a new one
a little one getting sewn write before My Eyes
I watched it until it was finished
and the coffee was ready
and then I looked at the scraggly apple
to see it festooned with more wet webs
and then I looked beyond
to the scrub forest
and saw the dew-laiden trees
each with more than one
enormous galactic web
spreading out through
My Extended View in front
of the early morning sun
wet on the Atlantic Ocean
The Hawk Kitchen Outpost 9:51am
I stood bare-footed beside My Rose
above It, twice
and first I heard a Blue Jay
and second My Mother’s Chickadee
and as I looked at the numerous blossoms
I heard the surf of The Cape
and reveled in the fog droplets
upon the fertilized leaves
Joanna Gilman Hyde 