Birthright

The sky leaked manna on the Israelites.
We don’t want God’s second best, they said.

So God gave them quail – but they let it rot.

I couldn’t tell, looking out my window, if the bright falling specks
were manna, or rain, or shattered stars.

Before I could run outside, they melted, or someone snatched them.
Jacob took the blessing because Esau let it go.

We must eat before the sun melts our bread,
before worms get in the quail.

Jeannette Winterson says what matters
is what you can do with the raw material of your life.

Like cooking red soup from wild boar, or antelope – or perhaps quail?

Nikita Gill says our atoms were plucked from supernovas and stars.
Light belongs to us from birth.

On a walk with my father, I see a single star suspended beyond my reach
between the clawed branches of two trees and think,

Somebody eternally is trying to steal my birthright.