El P?jaro Se Fu?

My bird disappeared last night.
I'd found it dead after it ran
Into the glass door while in flight.
I placed the poor thing belly up
On a nearby juniper bush
And religiously looked at my bird
Every night.

Though ice and snow fell on
Its slowly shrinking body,
With its wings laying beside him
As if they would were he coming down for a landing,
I watched and I waited for the day that
Nothing but its light and fragile bones would remain,
Cleaned by insects and bacteria,
Bleached by the sun,
So that I could take them inside,
Assemble them like a model
And have my bird with me forever.

Last night, my bird was gone
And I cursed the bastards that molested
One of God's creatures at rest.
Yet this morning gave me another story
As I saw a pile of feathers beside the juniper bush
And knew one of my totems had taken my bird
For a better purpose than to decorate my desk.

So I offered my apologies and my thanks,
For I knew the meaning of this:
Even in death we serve a purpose
Of one sort or another
And because of the order of the universe,
The purpose we must serve
Whether it be in life or death,
Is necessarily of the higher sort.