The Woodpecker’s Tongue

                                                           — After DaVinci

                  It barbs into the dead
                                    doug fir
                                                      at the end of the field.

                                                           Sunders soft
                                    rot
                                                      long
                                                                        as a child’s finger
                                                                        pointing towards

                                    the bird’s red crown
                  now flashing now
                                                      gone.

                Not metaphor
                                      but instrument,
                                                          more saw than
                                                                              flute.

                                                      It curls inside my skull
                                    as I sleep,
                  the old painter leaning
so close to my body—

                                                                        absorbed in coarseness
                                                                                          the tongue’s
                                                                        blue dusk

— that I can almost taste
the wine
                  on his breath.