Upstairs some angel is dreaming
about all the women it annunciated.
It is dreaming about the calluses
on the buff of their feet, how the calluses
change shape with their heavying bodies.
Small round totems. Objects
of worship.
:
Upstairs an angel is dreaming
about dead or dying animals.
Not about the slaughterhouse,
but the dilated eye, the hoof the nostril,
not about the basement of the slaughterhouse
but the noise of machinery and a single
swift running gutter.
:
In an upstairs room an angel is dreaming.
In an upstairs room there is an angel
body covered in eyes. It is dreaming
about all its eyes. About only having two
forward facing eyes. All its eyes
might be crying—the nightmare
of the human face, of only being
able to look at one cruelty at a time
and call whatever is in sight most urgent,
most unforgivable.
:
Upstairs I am dreaming
about having more
than one face. About my inner thigh
tilled like so many corn fields to sprout
not a paradise, but the idea
of a lost one. About the calluses
on the bottom of my feet.