Night crawlers separate the soil & my fingers
follow, snaring & exhuming, hooking; still alive—
though not in any sense we’d recognize apart perhaps
from my fingering grandma’s ribcage as it writhed & heaved under thinning
sheets
of hospital light—
bodies preparing themselves for entering another’s body.
Something larger at work, dad would say. Don’t cry
for the world. & I learned how to turn it to rain.
Rain is the best weather for this kind of thing. The soon-to-be-eaten rise
to the surface,
tempted by gesture: the sky’s tumult, a god’s tears.
The white cross of his arms over mine
steering flailing silver into the boat. Hollow-bottomed—
worshipful, almost satisfying—
a cooler full of beer I’m too young to drink & blood I’m just the right age for.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 22, Issue 2.
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