On his hands and knees under an
unnatural orange red-tinged sky
askew at his sides before and behind him shuddering larger and blacker by degrees
then faded
then oozing into the
surrounding red-tinted earth
because he was fearful to take to a knee make a silhouette
etch a target
he was afraid to rise upright
and run
crawling
fingers alternated between biting at the loose earth
frightened of
falling up
and wormed their way into the soil
like
burrowing insects
in the disturbed
loam and grit
his
fingers were queer antennae
they found hard bits
and
finding them he rooted at them like a pig
snuffing
and snorting
working at them with bitter fingernails
gaining
slight leverage he turned them
turned them with his
nails his fingertips
disturbed their underground cradles
he grunt and grunted
he worried a finger under them
stabbed and stabbed with it
he pulled and pulled
loosening
he yanked yanked
and giving way
he tore at the bits
a gob a clot of earth came free
and
flipped
and
the hardness he fingered
he dowsed
broke
ground upended in the redburning
light
Revealled
the bits
white
pinked under the descending
hue
pieces
bits of bone
and the bits unearthed
purchased more leverage and
became lengths of bone
ulnas radii femurs phalanges ribs and clinging s-curled spines
single vertebrae
ballheaded
bone and smashed socket remnants
toothy mandibles
cracked and split emptied bowls
of skulls
he rooted in a graveyard
unearthing
shallow mass graves
they woven ribbons of pits lacing
this gaunt terrifying field
at its edges its penumbra of light
beyond where he crawled
he
watched tall shadows arch their backs
curious of what he found
and seeing
seeing they faltered
waved and bent
the shadows sheaves of unkept grass
bowed
their seeded beards
nodded
and
clenched their eyes tightshut
he tried crawling towards them to
escape the rancid yard
but sensing his want to approach
they buckled
they touched their brows
to the black earth
their shafts
became
disjointed and crumbled
until
they too were dead
rusted brown chaff
once great wide swathes
alive fresh and green
dead
mouldering
and he
was
the only difference
the only reason
his physical presence had encroached
he
and the bones and their mangy gristle
he
scouring
this old battleground where lives and bodies were annihilated
destroyed by Will
and murderous machinery
by
whining bullets thrusted bayonets slashing sabers steelshoed horses commanded
by their riders to
stomp prostrate men to death
then
then the dogs of War
descended
snarling over scraps that still crawled and screamed as their bones were
twisted out from their joints
their meaty bones
rendered pulled in a tug-of-War between shaking
beasts
their massive heads and greedy
jaws wanting and knowing glut
unsatisfied
and splintering stolen
bones for its warm fat marrow within
then
their bellies swollen and filled
they
retired
they lazily lap the gore from their paws and forelegs
unconsciously they plop beside pools of purple blood
and play at them with bemused tongues
they curled their lips raised the flesh of their muzzles
and with their incisors
they
nibble at clots and knots woundup with
hair and clinging earth
it smelled of Rot
a breeze broke out from the
tall rush of distant green grass
tingling perfumed
scented
like rain
misting his face
anointing his back
wetting
his arms and legs
trembling quickly up into his nostrils
he rolled onto his back
stuck
his tongue out of his mouth to savor it
its
indescribable fertility refreshment
and Suddenly the air is scorched by hot
ashes
if
only he could rise
if he could get to his feet
and
run
stumbling to escape
through
the tall balustrade of trees holding the field hemming it
confining and concealing it
as if
only
the trees could stop the desperation of the graves and the old battles from
growing
madder and madder
and madder
2319, Super Moon Saturday, 9 8.
14
