Towhee & Sparrow

Towhees are sparrows. Electric eels are knifefish.

Oystercatchers could be more ambitious. We 

wade into slick tide pools trying not to crush

hermaphroditic sea hares. The Pacific never stops

eroding, never stops depositing. Seventeen ravens

eat what must have been a seal. Now those

same ravens flush and chortle. Now those same ravens

preen oiled wings. Flying foxes are bats. Mantis shrimp 

are nothing we know about. Mountain chickens

ribbit like the frogs they are. The new mole on your

right hip is a muskrat. You veer toward each

organism you fear. You veer toward our friends the killer

whales, true dolphins, misnamed and marooned.