Communion

For Brian

With a sweep of his arm, the tall man partsthe sky, swinging lanterns full of grain, golden censershung on the altar of blessing. A woman keeps vigil

at the window, her candle lit against the falling dark,while on this wind-bitten day, the sparrows gather,spiraling round for the flung seed, eating,

clinging to their perches. Then come the fiery cardinals,the top-hatted jay, the black-and-white zigzagof woodpeckers, hungry, silent. All of them gather

on the edge of winter, fierce eyes on grain spilledfrom feeder to earth. The slight birds' communionof seed, the pale snow's breath: what spirit hovers

over these gifts, what beating wings lift the soulout of its small human place, opening widethe heart's door, the earth's voice saying

here, take it, here is the gift. This wild scatteringof seed is yours, the light that gathers itselfinto these hands that knead the bread, that, too, is yours.

What rests on the table of earth is yours—take and eat of this, you who are born of me,bone of my bone. This is my body, given.