Holidays

I miss you on holidays not 
knowing why and think 
as I should of the sooty birds
who defied migration
only to become new species 
outside the light is damp
clouds swim the sky like 
flexed scars winter has 
taken away the animals 
and leaves and as always I wonder 
if it will ever give them back
I miss them with a sadness
that keens like the dying
of old whales & my usual 
doubts do not refuse to 
let me down 
I wonder if you get weary
too of the way time uses
our bodies like drunken
teenagers use cars
I wonder if you've learned to 
re-arrange your fingerprints
I wonder what you think
a kiss tastes like if you think 
it has a flavor like say
coconut or lime 
I wonder if you too have
electrocuted your heart
with tinsel just to feel alive
I wonder when the 
ladders of the sky 
will climb down to us 
and speak in so many tongues
the secret humiliation of 
store-bought wings.