What is it that moves
within the pane of mud
set upright somehow in the dry riverbed,

what glides & wrestles
obscurely in this monolith
ten by eight by three?
                            We

walk about it & watch
the thing that forces its face
through the sides of the block,

works its soundless jaws
like an eel, hair
& features caked with mud

& hear the gurgle of mud
in its throat.  O It is the
grandmother who loved me

when I was a child &
whose coffin I helped carry
one endless winter day.

She is now transformed
to this thing in its cage
of watery mud

& is active again
& pressing her face near
mine with the fierce

concentration of an
animal with its energies
pent up into a small place.

   Jesse Glass