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The Rube Goldberg Pacemaker

Jasmine Neosh

The bird in my chest
hasn’t moved in three days.

I keep poking at it
and talking to it,
trying to coax it out of hiding
with things I think
a bird might like.

I had my younger brother whistle
into my mouth today.
He rested his ear on my chest for hours after,
listening for a response.

He says the strings
may be too tight.
He says there is a strained creaking
in the accordian as my lungs
open, expand
and collapse:

the machinery in there wheezes,
bleary-eyed factorytown corpses
stomping their feet in hopeless protest.