Bug They show no signs of finding the food, though I’ve left it for weeks, though the winter is rough and a trail of hulls extends through the garden, and the birds, which are said to be harbingers of things, eat from the neighbors. In the yard: black seeds. Holes in the telephone mouth piece. Each one listens and sucks in speech, gives to me voice, the ghost of a voice. In the morning, the suction-cupped feeder’s slid from the window and splayed untouched sunflower, hard as words from your mouth. And now it is a dead mouth, and I think the soul must be the voice, that which leaves the body, that which I forgot first: music ribbon, melody hill. In movies, the detectives take the phone apart and find miles of curling wire.The listening device, that sharp-tongued piece, the bug, the plant, looks always out of place, is pinched between finger and thumb, held up to light.Then, silence! Silence. No one speaks. -51- ...