Iridencence

[Ekphrastic for "The Chatterers" by Henry Wilson Watrous]

"Hello, again, old friend," she seems to say
with the placement of her body. Her arm
hangs loosely off the chair like a coat sleeve
and says twenty things at once in a strange tongue.

With one eye, the crow looks at her sideways
then asks questions. His English, unpracticed,
cracks apart the stillness like dropped dishes.
"What have you been and where are you going?"

She tells how she has been watching magpies
change color as though they have no true tone -
feathers caught in crisis, imminent
metamorphosis propelled by sunlight.

He replies, "I watched you taking off
those ridiculous outfits, the fabrics wild
with patterned consequences, then settling
on a frock without stitches, bare at last."

Together they talk, their voices fading
in and out like a distant radio
loud enough to interrupt a dream

with its gentle song. Like lovers, they wait
for the next soft words to join them again,
then talk the world empty.