I see you at the Tashkent Museum, aloft, wall-pinioned, pigment eroded.

You, who were so beautiful in your prime, now pale with exhaustion, mute.

Bloodless copy of my homelands’ broad-tailed hawk, whose screeching scream

slices skies, like knives segment skin. Mind full of movement, firm feathers

bruise the clouds, different from this wall-confined painted bird. I long

for Sogdian wisdom to stream earthward from your thick-lipped mouth,

imagine a seductive smile below a beaked nose. Hints of hawkish acrobatics,

as birds mass in Texas. Caravans of buteos soar across the southern border,

far above fences, walls, and razor wire. Shredded clothing meaningless

to a clay-modeled bird, whose braided hair frames open eyes, brushes swollen breasts.

Terracotta body stretches to hawk legs atop rapier-tipped toes. Living claws grasp tree

limbs, small rodents, other game, fuel the seasonal fall into warmer climes. Mexico,

and further south, buried histories of walled-off American interests, booted troops,

stealthy dismemberments. Greedy, self-protective, like the hawk, who hunches over red meat.

Broad-winged buteo, like grounded wounded, uncaring about borders, seeking shelter.

You, who honored a banquet hall, bright-paint blazing, your narrative known. Eagle-woman,

one plumed wing outstretched, other clamped close to body, tightly-held as your tale.

Ancient silk road wanderers, much like people today, pushed by pestilence, politics,

pogroms into perilous crossings. Oh, painted bird, did you scope dusty roads, follow

Sogdian merchant-traders bumping along below, wares slung from camel humps?

Did you tire of human frailties, before achieving divine immortality at ancient Varaxsha,

stories spread through molded clay, and painted murals? Pigments continue to fade

with the centuries, firm-fleshed hawks continue to trawl the heavens, inspiring artists’ visions.

When will our dreams fly beyond the current nightmare?

Border deaths, brutality, and winged boxcars transporting families to camps again.