The Third Day

And on the third day,
We reached the gates
-Of the temple.

Brown, fair maidens
Received us with open arms.
A caravan of elephants
Followed in pregnancy.

The first ones there
Prayed to pillars of flame.
The second ones ate the ashes.

Now at last,
The gold-fed bones,
Crown the burnt altar grounds.

The natives declared us
A hollow kind;
We who ate death,
We, who found truth in vices.

Death Flower and
It’s son, War,
Sway coolly, in the
Subdued chaos
Of spasming bodies.

Lust glimmered in their eyes.
A womb for safe passage;
The gods need fertile dances,

Sacrifices, incantations.
Horn-rimmed trails
Adorned the stagnant steps
To the altar,
Where the fat ones burn.