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43 anOther GOOd friday, GOOd death It was easy: staring stonily into the ice-splintered sea of the glass, the cold anchor of a speared olive, ass adjusted to jagged cushion of rock amid a garden of skull and shards. Always easy: to toast his own mutilation, so natural, engraved epitaph of want. So right, old hound stationary and cautious of falling, snout west toward all that passes, panting smile to greet a breeze that, while merely echo of storm, still trembles just-greening crosses of limbs. The man allows himself a smile, too, recollection of the five dollars dispensed earlier in coin, twenty clinking pieces to a precise, mechanical purse. So seductive, to let it go, one’s life for a meager price, and to play both roles—for what friend might one trust with betrayal? Resurrection was the bother: the bitch, the bear, hammer, impossible chestnut. Now, cool liquid holy on his lips, clear blood. In three days she’d be home, these holidays passed over. He’d rise rotting from their bed, loose the tatters of a soiled shroud, scatter himself across her like ash. ...

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