The Winter of Amateur Cardiology – Vandal Poem of the Day

At this old desk of orange wood striated by dark wavy lines, I think

of electrocardiograms, heartbeats shimmying under my palms in a

white room in winter. A window to my right, gray sky, twitchy bare

branches. In the green of summer, a window full of maple leaves, I

liked to think that I lived in a tree. Now hot water circulates to the

silver radiator, knocks and wetly hisses. A painting hangs above the

desk, to the left. To look at it, I lift and turn my head so my chin is

over my heart. The radiator knocks. In the painting, a girl in a white

dress followed by a white dog walks beside a pond. The dog is in

mid-stride, one front paw a pendulum. Where I live, there is a pond

where the bankside winter grasses seethe in the wind as I run past

them. A red screech owl with a heart-shaped face and white-flecked

wings lives in a tree there. The owl’s feathers match the pattern of

tree bark. The owl can resemble a broken branch, its call a whinny

or trill. I’ve never seen it. I’ve seen the elderly bird watchers at dusk,

whispering, the black wings of their binoculars over their hearts.