Nest

Nine months later, they release
the police report, the autopsy
with its thin catalog
of scars.

There's one we can't place,
a mark above the heart.
An instant's broken hope -- what if --

It was her, of course.
Camping fire on her belly.
Childhood inside left knee.

What is the body but a nest
for memory? And what is a nest
when the bird --

We burnt it.

What happened
to her hairbrush? Suddenly
I want it.

To set on the patio table
by the tin of seeds.

Her smell and fineness.
A sparrow tugging --