A finch I guess, though God knows since

every other bird around here, it seems,

is a finch or a sparrow, passerines from

the order Passeriformes, which is like saying

I’m a guy, me and half of all people on

the planet, though I realize that’s getting

complicated these days.  But in the corner

of Dad’s balcony, the remnants of a nest

turn out to be less remnant and more nest,

three eggs out of sight until the finch

shows up like a blur of red in the corner

of a Diebenkorn painting, a thumbprint

that stands for finch (in my interpretation)

with the whole blue Pacific as background,

or in Dad’s case, though he’s not around

to notice the way he used to, the whole

brown Monongahela as background,

a coal train twice a day in each direction,

an echo to all these birds, half of which

are Passeriformes, or so says the internet,

definitely the two tucked in behind the light

fixture on my Dad’s porch, which he never

turned on; I’m pretty certain he didn’t

know where the switch was.  But he sure

as hell loved those finches:  I found

the copy of Birds of North America Dash

gave him for Christmas and he had

it marked with a cutting from

a Palm Sunday frond he kept on his

bedside table, and there it is, the blush

behind the necks, the rosy finch

in the picture just like the two behind

the light, attending to the eggs I guess,

laid before Dad died, and about to hatch.