I am haunted by those old gods
Odin, Zeus, Osiris
as shadow and blood rippling through my genes
ephemeral rifts in my body’s memory
knitting and re-knitting into a mosaic of runes and symbols best left forgotten
but constant still, looming as
the prickling of foreign eyes at the base of my neck
and the daunting weight of a storm cloud sagging on the horizon
and yet behind them is something more ancient still
shimmering beyond the taut sinew and tattooed flesh
some glistening form moving in the dark
as a puppeteer to the ichor marionette
shapeless, nameless,
for no child of man has dared to name their own cruelty
and capture the truth in all its monstrosity
again and again I try to shut my mind
against tattered, fleeting images of
smoke belching from the arrow-slits of stone keeps
thatch huts engulfed in flame
swords and knives swinging like the head of a tracking hound, desperately searching to slake their Tantalus-thirst in the chest of some new sacrifice to their masters’ gods
to shut my vision from the incense fumes which obscure a man’s reason
my ears from the primal shaking of silver chains and golden adornments of the temple whores, glowing copper in their dance, bathed in the torchlight mounting their altars
they sanctify their demons with the lust of men, and soft hands reach out to promise
rest to all who search their mysteries,
solace writhing in the embrace of Delphi and decay
to shut my mouth, and deny passage to the self-proclaimed oracle
the toxic and tempting, that vintage whose grapes must have been sewn in vineyards of ash, watered by the silent, stagnant depths of the mire that lay agonizing before the first word was spoken
and whose body is a slaughtered man, drained into goblets and poured upon the shrines of Dionysus and Dagon, down the throats of pretenders
promising salvation, and giving only loneliness
Those who make them will become like them, and those who are like them will make them in turn
It is viral, deadly, ever-hungry
man melts thrones into idols, and idols into thrones with no
ruler but himself and a deepened hate for the space between moments
for all that he will never understand
There is no place in my heart for these thoughts
There is no future in their practice
There is the poison, and the cure;
like the words of Asaph:
For you are angels, supernal beings, sons of the celestial, all of you.
But you will die as mortals,
you will fall like any prince
G-d give strength to the weary, and sure-footing to the knocked astray.
Remember to me the songs of David;
and I shall dwell in the House of the Lord for many long years.
