Mrs. Till
Open the box, she says. Open.
She has a body to inspect,
palms to cross, crucifix, bruise to kiss.
She wants to touch his bones, the jags
where his skull joined in continental shifts,
his willow fist, print for print, silhouette.
Open the box.
Her boy will not go hungry.
Small blessings stick
in doubt's ghost ship. Her hope:
it is another boy, a foreign face,
crate of chain, oiled crow, sugar cane
shackled petals, starry gourd
underground, the matted brown
shank of a dog, starched white sheets,
a corn husk doll, India ink, stacks of bibles,
dictionaries, the law, the law, the law
screws his coffin shut. Open it.
Seamed stockings on flour white legs,
a bolt of calico, a young boy staring
in the wrong place, the general store's
boards splintered to his face, his sweet skin
swollen and cracked, his strangled angle of limbs,
his fan blade choked throat - open it -
lordmylord - stigmata -
his ripened apple lips - holes ripped
in his hands - punctured ribs -
mylord - lord - hope dies last.
--Laura E. J. Moran, Live Bait, 2005