When they found the boy's body in the river

there was no sign of where he'd come from

his cat-gut hair sprawled to cover

the rock cut through his cheek

I'd heard about him on the train home from work

around where the tracks pull to the left

to avoid the abandoned quarry. No one knew the kid. I remember

some lady had brought a baby on the train who screamed

the whole way. Like it had a demon in it squirming

to get out. Those days we didn't get

what it meant, really, to find a dead boy with twigs

and threads still trailing from his arms. We could tell

it was a tragedy of a kind. But we were headed home

to glue our own strong cotton to branches, cut

from the forest where the wood was

the best for miles; we were still holding

out our arms and waiting for the glue

to dry, thinking, maybe, some day soon

we'd get to test our wings.