Читать книгу Ordinary Time - Michael D. Riley - Страница 14

Bull, donkey, lamb, goat, cow.

They share the redemption

of cell and story, fierce frost searing

them a little less, yet still palpable

as this birth, as rich with blood.

They stand peripheral

and hear the cries, woman and child.

They smell the active bringing-forth,

steaming breath like his. They escape

eternity together, into this

cold air where he is caught

with rough cloth, dried and held

above dirt, dung, the weight

upon hoof and sandal so permanent

in seeming. Everything miraculous

arrives in the world of breath, cold,

foul straw, wood rotten with use, oily wool

and the rush of cow stale onto the ground.

Crowds fill the narrow alleys and streets

outside, tallying numbers again,

birth and death their only kingdom.

These beasts might as well believe.

They do. Tethered to one more

child of billions, they know this short life

of burden and lash. They feel

with his growling hungers, wait for

love to materialize, insistent

as rut and feed herding us together

on a date no one agrees upon,

prepared to sleep on frozen ground,

the pain over and barely begun,

mutual breath holding on,

rhythms of listening instinct, that small

cry against her cold, warm breast.