Battered Angel

He abandoned Berryman, Henry and Bones
his armature of grief outgrown,
split up the back where he crawled out
onto the ledge,
his father's son at last.

On a bitter Minnesota night
with neither malice nor remorse,
his sentence served, John Smith took flight
from the Washington Street bridge,
a battered angel beating unseen wings.

He let go of the lying
and he let go of the railing,
giving himself up, finally and entirely,
to that long prophesied, unstoppable fall
into the icy arms of the Mississippi.


K.A.WOOD
2004