At Mt. Tamalpais Cemetery
BY BETH WINEGARNER.
The plain stone crypt
in a shawl of ivy, emerald and umber
drips and darkens in the heavy rain.
A small songbird, a sparrow perhaps,
darts from within, between iron bars
and into the sodden sky.
In another tomb, cone-shaped nests
are mudded to the white marble walls
and guano towers rise from the floor.
A Great Blue Heron strolls
through the bright grass, sovereign
in the deluge among the dead.
In Lone Fir Cemetery, robins gather
at Rose Wilson’s fallen stone
where rainwater pools between
handcarved gothic arches. The robins
take turns drinking and bathing as crows
gossip across the waterlogged lawn.
In Green-Wood Cemetery, lime-colored
parrots weave twiggy nests among
the brownstone spires at the gate,
a rampart against hungry hawks and kestrels.
“Interspecies architecture,” a friend calls it:
How birds forge new habitats from our grief.
Empty Air
BY BETH WINEGARNER.
I.
The still body on the earth
so small it would fit in my cupped palm:
A male house finch with his crimson
hood and breast, curious eyes
shuttered forever, toes curled
as if gripping an invisible branch,
as if one moment resting in a tree
or perched on the feeder,
and the next it was all over, so swift
he didn’t even feel the fall.
No sign here of a hungry predator,
only silence as tight as a closed beak.
II.
The birds and I trade: I keep them
in seed, give them places to drink,
bathe and rest, to raise babies,
and they sing to me, delight me
with their swoops and hops. I’m getting
the far better end of the deal, I think.
Normally when they die, I wrap them
in cloth or soft paper, pray that they’ll find
their way to the ever after, make sure
their spent bodies nourish the earth. To me,
it’s part of the deal. Now, avian-flu authorities
say I can’t touch him. My hands cup empty air.
The animal-control officer arrives in her
tidy uniform, gathers the finch in a
black plastic bag, knots the open end.
I remind myself he’s not garbage;
the officer is only protecting herself
and everyone between here and the lab
until they can discern what killed him.
Maybe then he will give up the secrets
held in the tiny songbox of his throat.
Tonight I Think of My Ancestors and Wonder
BY BETH WINEGARNER.
What ghosts haunted them
what songs they sang to soothe themselves
what homes they left behind
what lands they carved into new ones
what they couldn’t forget
what did they miss most
what they were grateful to escape
what clothes they wore to tatters
what soil gathered beneath their nails
what plants fed and healed them
what trees and rivers befriended them
what animals became their kin
what they prayed for
which gods they loved
which gods abandoned them
what wounds never healed
what children they buried
what stories they told the ones who lived
what stones they carved and carried
what offerings they made to the waters
what questions they asked the sky
what they whispered late at night
what kept them from sleep
what were their favorite words, their final words
what they still dream of, deep in the earth
what silences they kept and
what secrets they wish they hadn’t
what they would tell me now
if they could
Beth Winegarner is a journalist, author, essayist, poet and pop culture critic who’s contributed to the New York Times, the New Yorker, The Guardian, The Washington Post, and many others. She is the author of several books, most recently San Francisco’s Forgotten Cemeteries: A Buried History. She is the co-host of the Dead Reckoning podcast with Courtney Minick of Here Lies a Story. You can find her at bethwinegarner.com, and on Instagram @bethwinegarner.