for my father

I watched the cure flense him,
unwinding blubber and flesh 
from the great, floating carcass
of body, turning it in water,
unpeeling like paring an apple
and winding it back up
onto the dark spindle. I saw 
the cure grapple-hook
his spirit to strip it in spirals
from where it had once 
adhered to his heart.
I saw him reduced
to a jawbone a man 
could stand up 
and walk through.