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Description
First I learned to bury myself,
toe by toe in the mud,
like stepping into a tepid bath,
one that filled my nose and eyelids
with salty darkness.

I crept in inexperienced, fumbling with fingers,
feeling an unfamiliar heat against my shins,
compressing.

The dirt has a breath too--
musty and unknown--
earthquake breath,
tree breath,
bug breath,
shit breath,
sun breath,
moon breath--
a length-less breath that surrounded my body
with thousands of insect fingers.

After that I learned to talk like a crow,
creep like a cricket...
my mouth had many mouth within it,
and a tongue of flies.

I was the flower girl in my brother's wedding--
flowers grew through my hair
and coated my lashes with yellow dust.

And what I heard in the wind the night before I died
was lighter and quieter than a heron as it hunts.