summer_jackel

She knew he was a god. The stories
weren’t told less often, then
and she had heard them. She knew
how gods and heroes came, taking
what they would.

And he was magnificent, but she
knew the story, how it went. He came to her
all pale as morning, angel-winged
obsidian-masked, so red of bill---
his perfect swan-curved neck.

He just assumed. He was a god; he might
have seen the dagger with its silver roses
but when he pinned her neck and entered her,
she plunged the blade deep in
his snowy breast, her eyes serene.

She took the swanskin carefully
and rose into the sky a thousand strong
crying out a wild bird’s lonesome call.
The god lay dazed and raw. It was
so beautiful and overwhelming that he wept.

It is a wetland now.
Thick with wild rice and leaping fish
where grave-eyed waterfowl feed on cress
and twining berries; It is a place of riches.
But in the springtime, in the autumn, men don’t go there.