"The Generation of Tezcatlipoca"
Sep. 25th, 2019 06:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
child_of_the_airAfter a bit of a dry spell, I wrote another poem on Monday. It's not what I should've been doing with my time--the original draft happened while I was in a seminar class and losing focus--but I'm kind of proud of it, even if I feel a bit worried that it's appropriative to be using a Nahua (roughly, Aztec) god in this somewhat symbolic way.
In case it isn't obvious, this is meant to be a poem about the Millennial experience. It was written before I heard about yesterday's bad news, and so wasn't influenced by it.
"The Generation of Tezcatlipoca"
Our parents fattened on their parents' victories
And taught us that the gods were kind and loved us well:
They falsely promised us a flowery life of ease
And called us feckless when they did not bring it forth.
But we know better, thou whose slaves we are:
We know you have returned, to rule again,
And that the future is not promised us,
But only glimpsed through dark and smoky glass.
And yet we do not cry for abstract justice, Lord:
We are a people straining to survive your storms,
We shed our blood and fight to live another day
And offer up our hearts in this the near and nigh.
Our parents fattened on their parents' victories
And taught us that the gods were kind and loved us well:
They falsely promised us a flowery life of ease
And called us feckless when they did not bring it forth.
But we know better, thou whose slaves we are:
We know you have returned, to rule again,
And that the future is not promised us,
But only glimpsed through dark and smoky glass.
And yet we do not cry for abstract justice, Lord:
We are a people straining to survive your storms,
We shed our blood and fight to live another day
And offer up our hearts in this the near and nigh.
