Late morning
mother made me
hold the rooster’s legs
as she hunched over
holding the wings
a horizontal slash across the neck
The blood poured
into a round ceramic bowl
muscles twitched
in death my hands
struggle for life
It was a necessity for
the ceremony
father would perform later
for grandmother
sick in bed
the feathers plucked
in warm water
the rooster sits on a plate
on a table, its throat open,
listening to my chanting father
The blood cooked
with the body,
now separated in sections
on a table
where father chants again
Edible
it becomes not my blood
feeds my flesh
while its spirit
belongs to the demons, my ancestors
My friends ask
why I don’t go to church on Sundays
they don’t know I’m pagan
I don’t tell them
they wouldn’t care
We are too young
to understand religion
but we know about family
we know what matters
life and death and spirits
Mister Saechao 
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