Mummies from Xinjiang

Chinese peasants
peer through plexiglass
at their ancient ancestors

the mummies
in fetus-curl
or stretched out to the sky
have skin like rusted iron

stark ribs plunging
to taut abdomen

hair sparse and faded

frayed cloth around the loins

feet arched like springs
kept under tension
for thousands of years

toenails yellow as lacquer
mouth a hollow oval
cut from tight-stretched skin

eye sockets webbed over
and opaque

nearby
a blue fire-glazed
ceramic horse
with saddle of orange-red and yellow
its mouth stretching open
silently gallops
out of the past
its eyes ablaze
across the centuries.