Too Many Birds for the Roost

Bodies have a way
Of cramping stories
Even as the mind
Gathers more of them—
The body married

To another, years
And years, can’t also
Live out the stories
Of star-crossed lovers—
Nor vice-versa.

The tall can’t be short,
The musician can’t
Live life off-key.
On and on and on.
Bodies frustrate tales.

Stories throng the air
And roost like pigeons
In the mind. Body
Hosting the ruckus
Stays stuck where it is,

With what it is—not
One story, not just,
But never the lot.
It breaks body down
To host the whole crowd.