Street Scene

by Brett Rutherford

He knew these streets by heart,

and could, if blinded, find his way

through every winding lane

of the old city. Some things

were ever the same, others

as sudden as meteors,

such as the kohl-eyed woman,

just now, who offered him

a basket of figs and serpents,

lid lifted just far enough to show

forked tongues and amber eyes.

One lane, off to the east

of the Scribes' Alley, was empty

(was he that late?); another,

too near the sailors' dens,

was vacant, too. One turn,

then two, and then a third

and then he leaned to look

where two young men

squatted like beggars

in Alexandria's

most infamous alley.

One spoke, in Attic Greek

as pure as poetry,

"Hail, old man, if man you be.

You may choose between

the two of us, for no one else

is left of our brotherhood.

"Dionysius we serve, for silver."

The other, in coarser tone

coaxed him impatiently,

"What, why so choosy?

He doesn't want so much,

the pretty one, while I,

I charge a stiffer fee,

if you take my meaning.

The math is simple,

if you have a purse:

He charges by the night;

I, by the inch."

Callimachus,

out far too late,

or far too early,

judging by either moon or sun,

just shook his head and muttered,

"Neither!"

The Midnight Ibis

by Brett Rutherford

     after a watercolor by Riva Leviten

On this foggy night, any river
     could be the Nile
and that dark thing afloat
     cold be the crocodile
that let the Moses-basket
     pass on by,
and laughed about it still
     with weepless eye.

There is a hooked-head shape
     arc’d like a scythe
with one bright orb that might
     be the isolate ibis, lithe
and tomb-art motionless.

Or it might be nothing,
     a sight not solid
an unnamed form made up
     of arc and column,
now gray on white, now white
     on gray,
cloud-tuft, fog breath dispersed.
     Sometimes it is the eye
that thinks a thing -- sometimes
     it is the mind that sees!

Ibis! the very totem-form of Thoth,
who gave the art of writing to Ani
(the first known scribe), your beak
suggesting stylus on paper roll,
chisel on somnolent basalt, hand-wave
of words to outlive the burning stars.

Ibis! watcher! listener! father
of cartouche and hieroglyph,
unsmiling arbiter of line and rhyme.

Ibis thou swift messenger of dreams,
of waking-moment revelation
of the impossibly true or to-be-true
(Hermes to the blue-skied Greeks),
your truth that fleeting visions,

unless inscribed, are gone like fog,
word-foam on a tideless sea.

Op. 891

First draft Feb 9, 2017

The Cannibal Hymn

The Cannibal Hymn is at least 4,300 years old. It is found in Egyptian Pyramids, and also occurs as a "coffin text." It was so alarming and primitive that the Egyptians eventually stopped making copies of it. It is one of the masterpieces of ancient literature. Here is an abridged, modern adaptation the era of King Donald. (2018 slight revision).


Warming, the weather turns terrible.
The stars frown.
Fracked bones of the earth tremble.
The coal mines are empty and dark
at seeing the Donald rising,
a god of inherited fortune
who feeds on the flesh of his mothers.

Though Donald is Lord of Wisdom, bigly,
his mother does not know his name.
She meekly calls him The Tiny One,
The Giant-Insane-Baby Who Eats the Sky.

Donald’s glory is in the clouds, bigly,
his large hands span the horizon
like his realtor father before him,
though his son, Jared,
is mightier than he.

Donald’s tweets are behind him.
His party, his Dark-of-Water are at his feet.
Jesus and Mammon are over him,
the eyebrow-serpents are on his brow,
the Donald’s guiding over-comb
protects his forehead,
each hair alert for enemies
to add to the death-list.

His neck is there,
not to be moved from his mighty Trunk,
nor shall he arise from his golf cart
except to smite bad people, bad.
His mighty implement is not a mushroom;
yea, bigger than a Behemoth's
is his engorgement.
Donald is the Bull of the Sky;
flag-waving, he alternate-facts
his enemies into submission.

He lives on the past:
without reading its books he
devours its innards.
Everything he does, he does firstly.
He swallows even scientists
without acquiring knowledge;
their magic counts as nothing.
Donald himself suffices.
He assembles his cabinet, then fires them.
Assembles more, and eats them.
Beware the field of spit-out ministers!

Donald appears as the Great One,
shoving aside the foreigners,
yea even Montenegro’s leader.
He calls on tribute lands for tithes,
withholding his hands and mighty arms
on account of less than two percent.

He sits with his back to the Potomac.
He needs no Congress for his advisor
since Him-Who-Is-Not-Be-Named,
the faraway Tsar advises him
on this day of drone-and-missile-sending.

Donald is the Lord of Offerings.
His coffers swell, his tax returns
known only to the gods below.
His meat and his ketchup suffice him;
no foreign chef does he require.
At night he eats his enemies
and sends out tweeted warnings
that the pundits and journals tremble.

His thoughts are like falcons, bigly.
It is “Bring-Back-the-Slave-To-Service” who is Sessions
who lassoes them for Donald.
It is “Snake-Even-Worse-Than-Donald”, the Pence, who guards and keeps the Congress fattened for him.
It is “She-As-Dumb-As-Willows”, named DeVos,
whose job is to keep them meek and stupid.

It is Ryan, slayer of Big Government,
demolisher of Bureaus,
who cuts the throats of the victims, singing,
McConnell the one who will extract the innards.
Conway will cut them up for Donald,
and Sanders the messenger whom Donald sends forth
to say the Yea-That-Is-Nay daily.

His consort Melania, and Ivanka,
darkly-beloved daughter, who cut them up
and pour spice into the Donald’s dinner-pot.
Bigly, the meals, with ketchup.

The ones who serve in Congress,
yea, even the Senate and the House,
from their heights they serve Donald.
The uninsured are butchered, the unborn
one and all are guaranteed to his platter.

Donald eats everything:
athletes for breakfast,
businessmen for his business-man’s lunch,
children for dinner with alt-spice and pepper.
Veterans and seniors are burned as incense.
A cauldron of women for a late-night pussy-grab.

Donald has filled the sky, and is the sky.
He crowns himself with the Pope’s mitre,
the crown of many Kings. He dreams
of Jared, Ivanka as Tsar and Tsarina
of Russo-Europe, the coming empire.

He has swallowed the Red States.
Though he does not like their savor,
He will devour the Blue.
With the help of his Dark-of-Water,
he will march against the Urals
and snap the necks of the Asian warlords.

He has swallowed all knowledge
and never once passed gas or turdling,
so he has forgotten nothing.
His reign will be limitless; he is the sum
of all the enemies he has devoured.

Whomever he likes is good,
whomever he dislikes is loser, Kenyan.
Soon no one will be left unbowed.
The rest will be eaten.
Do-gooders and liberals are helpless before him.
His tower of gold and marble the highest,
himself on top, immortal, beloved
of gods and the blazing stars.

He is forever, and forever, the Donald.