Her father's eyes
turned slowly from the barrel of rain.
She held the kitten to her breast
feeling only the cold,
searching for life
and seeing only her father's face,

always her father's face,
his soft gray eyes
swallowing life.
She slept with the rain
feeling only the cold,
and held his magic to her breast,

hid him deep within her breast,
carried, in silence, her father's face.
Her cold
gray eyes
assessed his reign,
searching always for a scrap of her life

his life.
She held his lips to her breast
and drew him gently into the rain,
seeing only her father's face
within his eyes
and feeling only the cold,

only the cold
swallowing life,
hiding the infant's bloody eyes
as she held it screaming to her breast,
turning from it with her father's face.
She left it sleeping in the rain,

left it floating in a barrel of rain,
the cold
gray water reflecting the face
as it swallowed the life.
She held the blade's edge to her breast
and closed her eyes,

bidding the rain overfill her life,
washing, at last, from a cold, silent breast
her father's face, her father's eyes.