Considering all that I have: afternoon,
autumn light, the stillness most fall
afternoons hold; then consider
a bird stuck inside a pipe,
that too I have.

Searching for the source of a peculiar noise,
I find the cat atop the woodstove, her swishing
tail a horizontal windmill. Inside the stovepipe
a creature that slipped through the cap
and dropped into a narrow trap.

To strike a match would smoke it further up
or scorch it. Either way it’ll die.
Suddenly, that’s all I have.

Igniting a bed of paper and twigs
already set in the open firebox and with a fury—
does it matter if this is more like a dream—
not a phoenix but a scissoring finch,
flies through flames straight to the kitchen.

Cradled in the pocket of two baseball caps,
then swinging the front door open—this happened
last month, now it happens every day—
I free it into sumac,
into grackle trees, into the tempest
of birds beyond, waiting,
full moon faint in afternoon light.