Sarah Giragosian: The Last Animal

When we kill, we do it well.

I have paid to see their bones

encased in glass: rib cage,

incisors, broken femurs

suspended by wires. Skeletons

require care. Stuntwork. I’ve stroked

the memory of tortoise

in concrete parks, and loitered in halls

of heads and thrusting torsos.

When we kill, we do it well.

We strip the trees of music,

we miss the flowers, we forget

that metaphors are molecular.

When no one notes again

the inner tension of the crouching fox

before it vaults over the fence

or the hungry cat that enters a room,

tail swishing, to assert a mood,

who will notice the first signs

of the suicidal? Do not mistake me

killer, friend.