Of Sweat and Stars

Halfway between the extremes of the animal world.

I was born with four legs,
but it is taught in the
land of my fathers that
even we that walk as beasts
must pray before we sleep.
We hope for life upon waking.
But the odes we concede to
our children are echoes of wa,
of horns wreathed in flame,
and the gods of our dreams
are red in tooth and claw—
foreign to you as only
ancient writ can justly be.

Our tongues are thick
with the salts of the earth,
so that we speak in the
muddy tones of Purgatory.
My lexis is not great, nor small.
I know nothing of the sky,
or of legends set in light;
my limbs are not suited to
your polished marble tombs.
I live poorly, by the moon and
in that which stirs beneath.
There can never be a harbor
that serves as homeland.