Up on a hill is where we begin
The light of this long-past day
The red of the inferno
colors the walls indoors
Ancient blue of the pure rivers
from under a wartorn sky
washes over the ankles of Christ
I've killed lepers to sew this hat
and shot down phoenixes with my bow for this feather
I wish not to find
but to be
The woods have been chopped unevenly
as the friar picks a dead mouse
from the bottom of his leather shoe
Castles built before my time
will shiver to the cathedrals of tomorrow
or will these towers still be standing
when the seas are poison
and the deer walk on three legs
God is turning the sky from
morning to the last prayer
as the naked orphans run into
her mouth under jurassic teeth
A million strolls through the wheat fields
where dusk and dawn are the same gray
This food for piety
My family for this land
This hand for my father
The sober baron sits like
a mean statue in his parlor
draws a mean breath
for a sober lute beneath mean wrists
A toothless nun puts Christ on empty listings
while the minstrels jump
back into the dark caverns
as the sky wages a fierce battle upon our kingdom
I ascend the hill to hear
the town priest's last words
with scarabs crawling through my beard
and old age growing stronger than stone
Approaching my favorite clearing between the boughs
I see him!
Our Lord is a tomb in the sky
and I his most humble stump.
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