In the menagerie, in the mud

we are greeted by the rhinoceros,
tapping horns over a mouthful of hay

there is a branchless tree filled with tires and windchimes,
a punching bag. Little birds hop
in the stagnant water that fills their footprints

the children mill around your feet,
our boy peering out through a shark's mouth
our girl teetering atop this newly borrowed body

they face each other like railcars
in collision, like stormclouds or sumo wrestlers
in the mud

leather behemoths, creaking, the delicate hair of their ears
like pennants in the slightest breeze, the long hard slope of their foreheads
bony as triceratops

and you, and I, and our half healed scars
walk together
and the little birds sing at our feet