Enteral Nutrition

Chip-chip-cheree, the triumphant 

call of a fruitful journey; mother 

coos, mouth full, to her young. 

Digesting is too hard for  

my sister; she waits for the blender, 

chirp-chirping as it chews 

boiled chicken, baked  

carrots, tender 

worms, and dried seeds. 

Her small beak opens wide, 

dark as a gulf; the mush slides 

down her sinewy throat, dripping 

into the synthetic funnel, falling 

through the long sterile tube, sinking 

to the place where skin meets plastic, 

a river of food emptying into a gulf— 

the umbilical cord she 

never outgrew.