The report said,
        “Mildly deviated septum,
        otherwise normal sinuses.”

He remembered age four,
        excited, impatient,
Standing 3 steps up
        a concrete porch,
Holding a celluloid tube
        of tiny candy balls.

He’d seen older kids do this,
        even sharing once,
And now his chance
        to pry the plug
With wild fingers,
        only to spill everywhere —

His haste-driven dive
        to reverse the effects
Of gravity on plunging spheres,
        found his nose resting
On the sidewalk below,
        where he bellowed bad luck.

Soon, clinging
        to his mother’s neck,
As she wiped
        his blooded face,
He complained only
        about broken fortune.

His nose was quickly forgotten
        for a lifetime,
Until x-rays penetrated
        his memories,
Of sweet loss rolling away,
        yet still desired.

He was 4 or 3,
at the edge of memory,
When he saw a dead possum
in the road.

For 80 years it visited
his thoughts;
Nothing before —
not a mother’s loving gaze,
not a father’s good cheer,

Just a tail carelessly touching
a bloodied nose,
And two button eyes, staring
at god, at him,
at nothing.

Egg tottering,
        nest ruptured by careless wind,
        future flight’s dashed promise,
        embryonic wings unformed.

Bird ghost’s
        first and last airborne arc,
        parabolic to slate below,
        shattered shell and yellow stain.

Surprised child
        stops, curious, then home
        crying in fear, chased by
        angry mother cawing grief.