Reiz Sen Senos Laikos
a poem about god(s) and ancestors
Once, long ago, in times long gone, all of this has happened before, and it will happen again. She will sit on the swings as the evening sun breathes pink and yellow and orange clouds into the sky, And she will know that God with his beard and his Son doesn’t exist for her. There are only sunsets. And somehow, that’s better. Later, she’ll sing along with Tori, because the Anti-Christ is in the kitchen -he’s yelling at her again- And she’ll hide in the woods. She finds sun-warmed rocks to curl up on like a snake. Safe in the pocket of old gods, she is carried to other worlds. Later, she’ll toss Turkish delights from her bedroom window down to the raccoon that patrols the never-used garden. She has seen the legendary pictures of the Anti-Christ, surrounded by raccoons and foxes, searching his hard hands for the dog food he brings. And she believes it may be in her blood to hold court among such creatures. She’ll climb the fence, again, and again, to look for God rays that fall through the cracks in the green ceiling above her, to wait for the foxes that are her due. Once, long ago, in times long gone, she wonders why he wears a golden cross, but speaks with such wistfulness of the bonfires. More than 20 years later, when he’s dead, she’ll find the pictures of the wreathes and the dancing and singing in a forest. More than 20 years later, when he’s dead, she’ll dream about the pilgrimage for herself and his ashes. She wonders why he tells her to turn off MTV- Watch the news- Push her hair behind her ears- Smile more- Worry about the bombs going off in the Middle East. And she’ll build herself an altar in the closet. Lighting candles. Melting snow. Whispering to sunset colors and trees and rocks and leaves as if they could answer her wonderings. All of this has happened before, and it will happen again.
This poem felt powerful—mythic and loaded with deep feeling —when I first read it, but when you shared the “behind the words,” that specificity made it hit harder when I re-read the poem. I think it was that knowing who “he” is, situated roughly in time and place, helped me better understand the contradictions he expressed in his life that the poem sort of wraps itself loosely around, and knowing something about what he meant to you enriched the old-mythic feeling I’d picked up but not placed on my first read.