wildscape. literary journal

Some People Are Just So Uncomfortable With Death
by Caitlin Breen

says a woman who thinks it’s weird to be vegan, and fine—but
I watched an osprey crash into the smooth mirror of the lake
and rise, a small life clutched in her claws. I’ve crouched

and watched for hours the still blue heron
and the restless green one, each with beaks like bayonets
and necks that lunge out in the quick strike. The cormorant

diving from his swim and surfacing yards away. This is all death,
too. The world and its creatures, the ones I love, are engaged
constantly with death: its dealing and its avoidance. The killdeer

bursting from the rocky slope, their shrill cries insistent and panicked.
A screaming kingfisher chasing a hawk twice her size
away from her nest, and the hawk fleeing. The fledglings,

all kinds, their chorus of demands rising from the nest. 
I feed my cat cat food, obviously. What else would I do? 
I would tell the woman if she asked, which she didn’t, that it’s more

that I look at death, in the talons of the rising osprey,
in the strike of the heron, in the bad news
about my mother’s friend’s daughter, and I say, I will not be your instrument

when I can help it. I will bail out this sinking vessel
with whatever is to hand. This is probably what we’re all doing,
whether by avoiding meat, or writing letters, attending

protests, writing poems, walking to get groceries
in the rising heat of this world. Having children, 

or not. Taking communion, or receiving it. Writing poems.
Making the bed again. 

about the author // Caitlin Breen