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"Blood from stone/Water from wine"
It's a reversal, of course, of
"water from a stone" and "blood from wine":
the first is a reference to Moses' miracle of bringing forth
water from the rock during the exodus from Egypt [Ex 17:1-7];
the second is a reference to transubstantiation, where the wine
becomes the blood of Jesus. Reversed as it is in these brilliant
lines, however, the first phrase becomes resonant of the first
plague that God inflicts upon the Egyptians before the Exodus:
the plague of blood, which makes the water undrinkable [Ex 7].
The second phrase becomes a parody of Jesus' miracle of making
water into wine. [Dan Nooter]
"Canary got trapped, the uranium
mine. A stroke of bad luck, now the bird has died."
Miners would bring canaries into
coal mines. If the bird died, that meant the air was too toxic.
[Chris Piuma]