ii: stowaway on noah's ark

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**tw's: blood, body talk, religion, mention of drowning**

girl asks for a blessing / gets her heart cut out / she is the sacrificial ram
sent down to abraham / a leering tongue, grasping at skinfuls of blade / the knife on the forelock / no blood just the scratch

ugliness of the ritual / the mountains give the call to prayer / she bleeds inwards / on her knees / the mouth the original wound / open & / alive, she begs soundlessly

lost in her own goddamn prayer / the creator creates / he hears & hears & loves & / creates the flow of the blood & calls it river &

roughens the edges & calls it olive branch & creates the dead & calls it winter / she laughs

& he hears & does not send down the hurricane / girl asks for a miracle & so down comes the rain

clears her vision so she can see again / in front of her, her own 2 hands cupped / with pale

red running up the arms / veins mapped on the bare skin / the body her own monstrous thing / alive alive alive / limbs convulse

& the day begins. in time,
there is talk of the traitor
in gethsemane. girl asks to be given /
a new name / her fingers shake / pseudo-rosary pressed into her knee.

& so the animals sleep / the body
sedates / is a coffin is a pyre is a place
to gather & rage / where girl is taught to use spittle & all

the birds sing in chorus / a dirge for sinners / the girl asks for more & the creator

creates / a reckoning from above / a drowning of the son / & wife. a life /
line & then feathers of hope, a dove.

a day where the sun doesn't leave /
a restful shade to take / comfort from the heat. & in time

lush olive gardens / to pray in bliss /
& then the so-called betrayal / of iscariot's kiss.

& isma'il thanks his lord for sparing him.

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