The Magician’s View on the Efficacy of Marriage

The blackbird flew down my throat and took my tongue with it.
Feathers the light brown of a ripe banana and, like a banana, at least two.
Of the dozens of people on this patio each day, it chose me, my dappled skin.
Cognoscenti the Great, you might have heard? who wowed them in Innsbruck.
My heart is stuccoed with their sharp-beaked song.
Three: my tongue another bird flying in my body.
I contain them all, this grand, though small, choir of scavengers.
They eat well, living off my refuse, and I will not blame them.
Even for this pain, a quick scissoring surrounding my liver.
I suffer them; I do not endorse poison.
Sawing a woman in half is risky, so I saw rabbits into fifths.
I leave them, unbloodied, apart, since they are cheaper to replace.
Eight or nine, my liver dividing, flaking into nutritious wings.
When I was young I vanished the insides of eggs with a strong breath.
Last year I hollowed a woman, left her in a hollow house.
Done perfectly, the shells remain as perfect and as strong.
The pieces of the rabbit hardest to dispose of are the tracking eyes.
It is time for the check but my throat has taken wing.
What is exiting me from every pore?

Andrew Kozma
“The Magician’s View on the Efficacy of Marriage” appeared in Backwards City Review, Vol. 2, #1 (Winter 2006).