The Play of Light and Shadow

We want to give ourselves away utterly but afterwards we resent it, it is the same with the sparrows, their eyes burn so coldly under the dusty pines, their small chests swell as they dispute a crumb, or the empty place where a seed was once: this is our law too, to peck and peck at the Self, to take turns being I, to die in a fierce sidelong glance, then to hold the entire forest in one tilt of a tufted head, to take flight suddenly and fuck in midair, tumbling upward.