children's bible

i liked to feed goldfish crackers
to my bible. 
i watched the book's spine bend
& snap as it accepted them. i asked,
"can you tell me again the one about 
the loaves & the fishes?" the book,
always eager, spoke. i liked 
that story best because it was about hunger.
i would see all the mouths & the teeth
like stoop steps. 
the book would tell the same story
different every time. sometimes 
there was a knife. other times there was
a little boy who ate the scales. 
sometimes i was in the stories.
a little disciple or a donkey. other times
the whole thing was loud & full of birds.
i wished i could be inside one of
the book drawings. 
they were bright & bleeding. i didn't 
really want to be holy but i thought
i did. i prayed until screws fell from
my mouth. the book beat its wings.
flew & perched on the top
of my bookshelf, waiting for me
to call it down again.
no one knew where the children's bible
had come from. my mother or father
didn't buy it for me. maybe it had
wriggled free from the dirt
or maybe there was no bible
at all. just a tiny bird who 
believed he'd visited god. sometimes
you can get so in love with a story.
it becomes your body.
i have woken up with words
on my skin. poetry. the songs of 
dead bugs & pigeon iridescence. 
i told no one else about the bible
until years later when i went
looking for it in my childhood bedroom
& could not find it anywhere.
i found a mildew-smelling bible
but not the children's one.
sometimes when i eat bread 
it regenerates. i eat the same piece
again & again & i know 
the book is close by.
just beneath the skin.