Bulbul, don't look so nervous.

I know the light can be brutal

but let me apply

angled lines of sindoor on your

throat, along your breast and

dot your lifted brow.

I imagine capturing you under my

anglepoise, Bulbul, coaxing

your wings to flare

and settle on my palm,

deepening the colour

of my hands.

I watch you

through the gap

in the window screen:

your compacted heart receives

the broken bread

whilst the rain nibbles

at the blossom,

you gaze at a bud,

listening hard for a miracle.