Before I could study the
matriculation in front of me
a discordant sound emerged:
harried shouts accompanied
an outpouring of Kali’n’ago
from smaller side tunnels
to the widest in this chamber
I followed the commotion
away from the tree and pond
and was soon surrounded
by scores of my hosts;
it was clear they were both
escort and protection
as the unmistakable sounds
of violence ricocheted from
up and around the curving walls.
Their mass carried me along
like a leaf riding a stream
but failed to reach the gentle shore
they were seeking
when battle fell around us.
The opposition was impossible
for me to distinguish from
my protection and within the tight walls
there was no room for me to
draw my blade.
I could do little more
than watch as one by one
my escort fell
to the cudgels of the foe.
I was soon surrounded
by a new escort and they
roughly pushed me upwards and along
until we were disgorged from the
warren. When the group
thrust me onto the windswept
sands, a violet cry
of jubilation arose from
all around me.
I was their intended prize
and the victory was won,
I was immediately placed inside a cage
built atop a sleigh and
yolked to a dozen Kali’n’ago.
As our retinue made its way
with the wind into the gloom
I saw a detail laden with
the still bodies of the fallen
dragged
onto the sand and buried
only slightly, so
their mounded bodies imitated
the smallest of the looming dunes;
in a flash I intuited
the bluish white sand was
not sand at all
but the granular remains of
generation after generation of
Kali’n’ago that came before, ground
by the ceaseless wind
and the traveling feet of those that persist
into powder bluish white,
fit for an hourglass.
As we trod on
the dark wind upon our backs
clusters of my captors
came to gawk and jeer
some few made attempt to force a squawk
by pulling out a feather
and dancing about my cage;
or tossing handfuls of the dead into my face –
mock on, mock on
for well I know
when you throw sand
against the wind
the wind only blows it back again.
A solid day we sailed on the sands
until, squatting on the short horizon
loomed a solid darkness
a grand steppe with a steep incline
a prominent promontory winding upwards into
the gloom and leering ominous.
With quiet desperation I cast back
upon all that I had seen:
the sands of the Kali’n’ago is the water in which they swim
a fish hanging in the air it’s mouth upon a berry
a feather traded for a net and they with the better exchange –
my conviction that they
knew not the ways of
civilization
as we ascended that upwards path
My thoughts returned to Beauty’s tower
and the riddle of the drowsy sword
and I thought…
that they did indeed
know the ways of civilization
and it was I
by my very presence
carrying Ignorance not only upon my back but
in a vast miasmic cloud
and with a pale cast of thought
it occurred to me
that my blade was no help
to me at all among them
and when I held Beauty’s blade
against Pride’s throat
and read the word inscribed there
I never saw what might
be inscribed upon the
obverse side
so
I pulled the blade from
its tower and saw again ACQUISITION
engraved along its length
with trembling hand I flipped it over:
THYSELF was there inscribed.
My laughter was a bark both forceful and loud,
I stood proud in my cage
and made myself known.
The blade in my hand
now a lightning bolt crackling from its hilt
the bars of my cage blew asunder
with an explosive thunderclap;
this was no mere sword of knowledge
but the sword of Socrates and
such a sword remains with one until
their dying day.
The Kali’n’ago who took me
fell back in stunned silence,
pieces of shatter’d cage all ’round
their faces mute and dim;
I extended both my wings and
strode sword in hand into their assemblage
carrying onwards and upwards
toward our destination
their captive, now on point –
they followed me
to the top of that roaring steppe
to the spot where they thought
to sacrifice
and to where I
knew I had to be
the steppe was high, wide and flat
as the Kali’n’ago took up a joyful singing
they moved in rhythmic dance.
Their faces shone with banded light
and their voices raised in harmonious music
I danced with them, weaving my way to the very
center of the throng,
my wings extended wide
their banded faces glowing free
they each removed a single
feather as we wove together in melodic step
leaving me two denuded wings.
As their voices reached crescendo
I cut the barren wings deftly from my back:
I am not a fallen angel
or a plucked fowl
but a risen ape
and as I
tilted back my
head and swallowed my own blade
the glowing Kali’n’ago, singing, and dancing at their brightest
let loose all their feathers
into the ceaseless wind
each a bird in flight
in one direction
and the wind
stopped.
