Communion

On the ashed altar of the street: A cat’s

anatomy—filimental whiskers

and steeple ears, the unraveled sermon

of her viscera. This is my body, broken

for you.

 

We partake: mites creep up her aisles

on their knees and the birds fall

like prayers. They—the cat, the mites,

the birds—are scattered some by cars.

Exhaust lingers

 

where the breath of life has rushed out

her chambers, through her

curtain tongue, the long note

of an alto before the organs

are silent.

 

I wonder where she was going,

if her parents know, how many times

she will be washed by the rain, if her soul is dim

in the belly of a blackbird.

The mites are sincere.

 

In their nests, her eyes will fill

Five-thousand.