were onto something, separating the good god / from all of this, but you’re so stubborn, you / insist on hanging dead in the web

Is it always necessary— / I think but do not say— / for the eyes of men / to penetrate the ways of the most high?

And so, emboldened by what the angel told them, / off they went toward Bethlehem to find / the swaddled babe and manger and lolling beasts, / their beauty and their beings ramified / in carols lightening our lamentations

We cannot see our loved ones, shut into hospitals / like mysterious shrines, taken out alive or dead. // They close our eyes. We have no say in whether / we breathe or not.

The waters of the Sonoran Desert are scarce and wily. In O’odham lands, shy rivers will retreat underground, seeping into the sand, as if to rest from the seen world for a while.

Each body a consecrated temple. / That means // sister, no one needs to see / past your knees.

This faith was not mine / this bite into colorless / this flush with skin and bones / this eating the circle this / fingering of names

Today, in a comprehensive fulfilment of biblical promise, your iPhone, which counts your steps and is acquainted with your ways both public and private, will offer to route your path home and watch over your lying down.

It’s as though the movie represents an alternate life for any of us. Take away a job. Take away a spouse. Take away an able body. Take away good mental health. How many of us could maintain our current lifestyles for long before we’d feel the crunch, the walls closing in?

He’ll rewire you / Because you let him, no, because you were looking / Always for someone who could.