Preparation for the Impending

             A scritch in the eaves, in the dark
of earliest morning; the tumble of a soft
             body I imagine has slipped from a tree—
Whatever it is bounds away across 
             our shingles. Though I strain to hear,
there don't seem to be any sounds 
             issuing from a throat, desperate
to loft signals for help into the air.
             I tense for them, despite: signs  
of a body already in transit, oblivious to light
             lifting in the canopy. The bulb  
of an ankle, purple-streaked, swelling 
             with fluid. Walls hardened around organs  
that float, islands in a sea of carnelian flowers. 
             The crown of a weed is its own miniature
sun of reckoning. As for us, we're helpless, pinned   
             against the fabric, faces upturned. If only
we could hear the sound the soul makes escaping; where
             it slips from this net into the unbroken.