I
Big straddled dry earth, sighed
Micturated;
a pristine lake
atavistic fishes
flurried, gaping for hooks.
People prayed for Big’s sake.
Big, tumescent, crowed. Big
bid frigid mud
wake, open joy;
A shout, a cry, a thrust.
Nine moons rounded the child
Big spat out: people’s Boy.
Said Big: crown Boy your prince.
They did. Boy spoiled
himself with bold
conceit: took himself for Big.
Said Big: string your bastard
up. People wrung Boy cold.
Big wept, turned cities where
temples wrote high
Big’s name to seas,
where floated game
and horses grieving for
clover. Big watered over.
Sinking people bubbled pleas.
Big relented. Dry land
maculate, rose
to greater height,
bereft of those
Big relied on. Now Big
awoke dead souls; said fuck,
buy, sell, sleep, steal, pray, fight.
II
Big rested one thousand suns
’til some stench crept
through Big’s old dream,
noxious, chiding.
One half burned the
other half. Some died
Some prayed. Smoke noosed Big’s scream.
Big clouted that pretense;
Thunder coughed, sun lapsed,
Big’s rain scored
flames people tended
with corpse and corpse.
Big rained to no recourse.
Fire fed, people painted Big’s Face
On killing wall, killed more.
Big admired such fierce
determination. Big
brought back the dead
to burn again.
People appreciated
Big’s generosity.
People scribbled, wrote books,
words they said Big said.
Big heard raucous shouts
from some Big used to love:
Great Big great lie.
Big’s flames, Big’s floods
they ascribed
to wind, concomitant
currents whirling in Big’s Ocean.
Wordless, Big lay down to die.
III
Big keened a million eggs
cracking out chicks
one million stones
worrying to
dust. Still the taunting shook
Big to Big’s lucent bones.
Big now beckoned blackness
wordless soundless
tasteless fruitless
naught and nothingness and night.
Night now comes: not a star
to mourn Big’s new muteness.
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