You are at home in a mob
attracted by others calling
you out. Your PETER-PETER-PETER
a song any slight bird can sing.
No ascending trill gone unmatched

just the usual birds. Yours is a beer
song, an all-occasion, feather-
my-nest with any quicksilver thing:
some hung-over chick’s discarded
pull-tab plucked from high grass.

Black hair long enough to spiral
your nest’s walls. The object
of her undoing your bright spot
amid long days of sophomore girls
who hear only their own shame

in the song you sing at dawn. Used
up notes repeated ad nauseum.
They say you are common, a tit-
mouse, a comely bird performing
acrobatics in an unruly crowd.