Desert Communion
In the headlights' glare I spot it,
a little pale altar
of bone and brush
beneath a highway marker
sixteen miles out of Nogales.
Here is the body and the blood
deconstructed,
remembered flesh and
white jaws that slack
into sleep.
I do not stop.
But in the rearview
I see through the red glow of tail lights
that a desert poppy
has pushed up between
the ragged ribs,
and I know this
unexpected resurrection
is His way
of speaking to me:
Rejoice,
Daughter of Eve,
in little miracles—
for you, too, began with a rib.
In the headlights' glare I spot it,
a little pale altar
of bone and brush
beneath a highway marker
sixteen miles out of Nogales.
Here is the body and the blood
deconstructed,
remembered flesh and
white jaws that slack
into sleep.
I do not stop.
But in the rearview
I see through the red glow of tail lights
that a desert poppy
has pushed up between
the ragged ribs,
and I know this
unexpected resurrection
is His way
of speaking to me:
Rejoice,
Daughter of Eve,
in little miracles—
for you, too, began with a rib.