The Gods Themselves

I have met the gods. I have made table with the gods themselves.

I drank their honey mead in a starry dynamo of night

with the moon on our faces like second hand sunbeams made anew.

I saw their best minds destroyed by madness

and I crossed oceans of time to find them.

I saw mending walls,

five kings and good nights marred by ungentleness.

I sang of the gods.

I gave praise to the gods:

the gods who planted real toads in their imaginary garden trips,

who broke on through to the other side,

who were both sung and unsung,

who died forgotten in flop houses and gutters

and drank too much while the sun went down and came up again,

who burned their wounds like old dry garbage

while murdering men and owning wives,

who made the blackbirds rough today,

who sang for their countrymen and died with their countrymen,

who circled Hell and told the tale,

who glowed the frozen waters with their rainy raindew

and made mad magic in the middle of this song's lament,

who sacrificed their sense of self for a sense of self and a song of self,

and who asked the hard questions to which no one knows the answers,

not even the gods themselves:

for them and only them I sing this my heart's hearty libation

for which the gods themselves give praise.

- 2/24/2014