Mcclelland & Stewart, Belletristik, Small Mechanics (Englisch, Lorna Crozier, 2011)

LAST BREATH Not a living soul about, except for me and the magpie. I know if I don&rsquo t keep moving, he&rsquo ll pluck the breath from my body, taste it on his tongue before it slides down his throat, giving him new prophecies to speak. He&rsquo s the bird Noah didn&rsquo t send out, afraid he&rsquo d carry the ark&rsquo s complaints to heaven. Tonight he scallops from the copse of willows to the power pole, stares down at me. I match him cry for cry, not knowing what I mean but feeling good about it, the bird part of my brain lit up. Coyotes, too, start their music as if the magpie&rsquo s flown in to be the guest conductor for the length of time it takes the sun to sink. He flips his tail, bringing up the oboes then the high notes of the flutes. Other souls, those I sense but cannot see, wait among the stones along the riverbank until they&rsquo re sure the magpie is distracted, then scentless and inedible to anyone but him, they make their wingless foray across the ice and running water, mouthfuls of silence that, if not for coyotes, the magpie would hear. DON&rsquo T SAY IT You admire the wild grasses for their reticence. When you cut across the dusk for home, the meadow is more beautiful for all it keeps inside. Syllables of seeds catch in your socks but they don&rsquo t need to say, Thank you, friend, even if you&rsquo ve carried them for miles. THE FIRST DAY OF THE YEAR The new writer sucks her fingers in her crib. There is nothing to distinguish her &ndash like the extra toe on Hemingway&rsquo s literary cats &ndash from all the other babies down the block. She is dreaming ink though she hasn&rsquo t seen it in this world yet and no one knows, least of all her parents, she loves nothing better than the blank flat whiteness of the bottom sheet when she&rsquo s laid damp from her morning bath upon it.