Manifesto of What Breaks

If window, if scaphoid, if beak
of the rock-struck warbler, then stickball,
then sidewalk, then sling and stone that flies.
They demand splint and plaster, nail
and brace and glue. They beg grass to bend
for a meadow of runners, but all
pliable wishes die inside the bone.
What I’ve forgotten of compromise
I know of sacrifice: The spent
myocardium. The faith that makes
men tear temples down. There’s a boy:
his voice. A woman: the tide that
sweeps her baby in. Frogs into
song. Thunderstorm and then elm. Me:
bridge. Me: milk tooth. Me: awl of dawn
that perforates horizon’s belt.
To get a hundred million parts,
you must ransom one whole.
Just pray fingernail, levee, fever.
I promise to wait for you where
the high-tensile fence divides intact
from fracture, but I’m also cross-knuckled
fingers that say undo, undo.