The 1040 is blank on the table

The 1040 is blank on the table.

I’ve watched the oak for half the day.

I’m not as steady or as stable

as the sky, which stayed a flat-line gray.

Then the squirrel jumped.

The yellow tube hit the mud with a sound

like a bone snapping. I slumped.

All that expensive seed scattered on the ground.

I wanted to scream at the fur, at the tail,

because the birds never came, and I am so pale.