Ignatius to the Romans

Be silent. Hush. Take up the sound of ooze
like oil from olives that the presses bruise.
Or be the sound of fresh baked loaves, the sound
of seeds beneath the stony, sun-packed ground.
I’ll be the noise of wheat beneath the stone,
or, caught jammed in the leopard’s throat, a bone
rattling jagged, heard as just a wheeze
the beast exhales into the copper breeze.
Or hush and let the leopard’s windpipe be
a tunnel I stumble through as best I can
in darkness which obscures but can’t consume,
from which I’ll come into the sun to see
the full-sized shadow of a full-grown man
thrown on the grass beside the empty tomb.

—Ben Myers