A Poem for the háawtnin’ & héwlekipx [The Holy Ghost of You, the Space & Thin Air]

’inept’ipéecwise cilaakt: (I am wanting to) hold a wake / (I am wanting to) hold the body Had this body been made of nothing but its bright skeleton & autumn- blown skin I would shut my eyes into butterfly wings on a mapped earth. Had the gods even their own gods, I could re- learn the very shape of my face in a puddle of sky- colored rain. Extinction is to the hands as the lips are to the first gesture the tongue carves into the slick mouth just before prayer. In every way the world fails to light the soft inner machine & marrow of the bones in motion — I imagine smudging my tongue along a wall like the chest I dare to plunge in- to, the Braille of every node blooming out as if the first day- light of wintered snowfall. This night — like any fleshed boy I dream of a lyre strung with the torn hair of hímiin& in place of my dried mouth — there it is. Whispers in the blue-black dark after c’álalal c’álalal reach out toward my teeth to strum this wilting instrument. & once awake, I’m holding its frame to build a window back in- to the world. Had this body been held after all these years, I would enter you to find my frozen self & touch. Like the gutted animal we take in offering. & live.