I weighed a bird

I weighed a bird when I was a little little kid, it was a pet parakeet
my father mother and I were living in a third (or fourth?) floor walkup
railroad apartment (hallway ran from the kitchen in back
through the bedroom out to the "front room")
the apartment house was not too far from the Hudson River
in a poor part of town most of which was torn down
to widen a main road and because it was old
and out of synch as things progressed (but
I went back there a few years ago to bury my dad
(he was pushing 91 years when it happened)
and our little street was still there
pretty much intact maybe because
there was a Catholic school there everywhere else
was either shambles or gone mostly I took the birdcage
out on the wooden back porch where my mom
would clothespin the laundry on a line
attached to who knows what at the other end
and wheel the line out I opened the cage there
cupped the bird in my little hand and put him down
on a bathroom scale that I guess was really a
back porch scale I don't think I brought it out there
they must have kept it out there for some reason,
hmm, one of the mysteries of life, and of course the bird flew right off
and the mechanical scale registered nothing
that night my dad tied the empty cage to the clothesline
and wheeled it out, little door swinging,
and here came the parakeet and it sat
for a few seconds on the line
I swear I remember him looking
at us and then at the cage
a few seconds, and then flew off
what chance did he have either way?


~~~~~

(impromptu, after coffee and such)