only a blade of light makes it
through the eye-slit to the eye.
inside inside sweat from the living
dances with the dead’s tanned
stank. in the leather shop south
of market i run my hands over
the animal heads in back behind
the harnesses & straps while
two men who are now surely dead
perform at pleasure on a screen:
the scene is military, the men are sweet.
alone i palm the pig head & hold it
aloft only to slide it over me:
a grandmother’s dress & am
transposed & transpossessed back
inside the cow in its lake
of cows penned close as text
outside some missouri township
all knowing they would die but none
imagining they might be remade
into the perverted image of a different
living animal then worn by a man
wanting to be regarded as livestock.