sister was the wolf

sister was the wolf

& could cross easily through

the mountain dark to den

keen & quivered with

the muscular siege of slit    purse

purple with hours

purse purple with birthwork

her sight both inward-

& outward-lit

on what small sparkle of pyrite

in the silt or the thick smell of her own

wilderness opening shit & hair & blood

each little birth

an astonishment of form

inside its own tiny veil

licked toward the air of this Other Side

     [Live!]

then that sound

from the hospital’s infant table

after what seemed like years

of silence     a mew

which held inside it

all the voices of

this dream & other animals

trying to begin