Mathias Svalina lives in Lincoln, Nebraska. He has recent or forthcoming poems in Blackbird, Hotel America and Pleiades. Litany Mathias Svalina Shade:          new buildings require fresh blood, or, with reservations, a boy’s shadow trapped in the foundation. Shade:          by candlelight the solid outline of the body flickers, splinters into a wavering spirit. History:         1144; a nun sees a dead boy in the woods near Norwich & continues walking, then a traveller sees him & townspeople bury the boy in the woods. History:         a week later his family visits the grave, disinters the body, presumably cries, & reburies him in the same spot. History:         then a month later his father accuses local Jews of cruci- fying the boy. The rotting body is translated to a monks’ cemetery near the newly built cathedral & becomes a pilgrimage destination. Sun:             even your fingertip has the power to blot the sun. Lincoln:         in this city one can see no shadows at noon. History:         a child in blue pants tries to bury his shadow with white gravel from the garden path. Shade:          even now my shadow waits for the light, for the hot touch of a scabbed wound. Sun:              try not to step on your shadow on the sidewalk. Warning:       Gravediggers! Tie your shadows to your waists lest they fall into an open grave & become rebellious & tired of ignominy. History:         there was a crucifixion fetish: boys & girls piercing their hands & feet in filthy ecstasy. Shade:          not only the building but the shadow of the building. Lincoln:         1255; Lincoln townspeople accuse a Jew of killing a boy in ritual. Under torture the Jew admits to a pan-European Jewish con- spiracy of blood leaking through the shadows. History:         noonday sun casting swinging shadows of 19 hung men. Lincoln:         priests buried the boy’s body in the newly constructed cathedral. Shade:           the boy’s shadow in the foundation protects the new building from ghosts & shades.