“Canopic Jars” by Samantha Zighelboim

Stomach

Teeth remain but lips do not.
A flattened pouch filled
With a jackal-headed god’s
Crumbs, a steady and tasteless
Nourishing, until again the
Lips burn, hungry for fowl
In the infinite field of reeds.

Lungs

Tree dismantled. One half
On top the other, losing pink
Quickly. A baboon’s snout
Blows the new air of a god
Inside and during the rise
Twin sponge-roots relearn
To expand, contract, expand.

Intestines

The longest road of the body
Is watched by a hawk-faced god
Who flies the Nile’s length
In two wing-beats, collects
Water in his beak and returns
The river’s still blue coolness
To the driest coil of flesh.

Liver

The usefulness of what’s left
Behind—blessed by the hands of
A god with a human face, wide-eyed
And mindful. Four parts, four winds
Stilled, the kind of silence needed
To end and begin. To make venom
Essential, to warm again the blood.

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