LatinosUSA

Featherless.  Not an ounce

Of air in these bones, 

Dense with marrow

And the traffic of blood.

Calcium solid.  Two legs, 

Thick-thighed, heavy-calved, 

Over-boned knees,

Broad flat feet, nails not claws.

Two arms and a fervid desire

To perch on window sills

On the eighty-eighth floor,

If only for a smokeless breath,

A respite from the sudden fermentation

Of fuel, the culture of heat. 

Dante circling the bubbling steel. 

Nothing that resembles

light horny epidermal outgrowths:

The quill, the vane, the barb, barbule, 

Barbicel, hamulus, needed to flutter 

To the eighty-ninth, ninetieth floors, 

And out over the cloudy river waters.  

A few feathery steps, 

A jump into the fire of flight,

Suit, blouse, billowing plumage, 

Arms feathering the air, 

Flamed by falling floors.