Two-hundred and twenty-five
               at the slaughtering of sheep
for vellum.

Humble ones, it was your body
               that herded
you to the basement
in the monkery. I was never

this sick before. You didn’t

have the ability to conceptualize,
               or the dignity
of a soul.          Strings plucked, later,

bowed; water cascading from a clepsydra.
Father Mark drove you

here: into the humidified
stench of blood, the under-mill.

Meg Matich