The Augurs Are Taking The Auspices.
after Matthew Zapruder
When the NPR anchorwoman tells me
The sewers run red with blood, I am sure,
for an infinitesimal shred of a moment,
that she is quoting some Bible verse
I once knew, a verse I had memorized
and then tried to forget, maybe the one
where sweet Abimelech killed his 70
half-brothers on a single stone
in Ophrah; or the one about Samson,
after the Philistines cut his eyes out
with a sword, when he pushed the pillars
of their temple apart and the roof fell,
killed everyone. I turn down the radio
in my car and whisper the words to myself.
The phrase has a different timbre
than I would expect. I realize that it’s
not a Bible verse, just sounds like one.
Tripoli sounds like a fun vacation spot.
I imagine white beaches and palm trees,
not so different from where I live now,
and stiff alcohol that comes crowned
with umbrellas, carried by beautiful women
who want to give me a massage. But this
just in from the inconsiderate anchorwhore
on the radio, apparently Tripoli is where
the sewers of blood flow and I’m grossly
mistaken about the whole vacation spot thing.
The rebels are strapped with machine guns
and America has sent the drones, war birds
with Hellfire missiles. They kill for freedom
I am told. I stare outside my car window
at the grackles on the telephone poles.
These birds are harbingers, I mutter.
I have no idea what that means. Maybe I speak
in the Spirit, if you have ever heard such a term.
I remember watching my pastor profoundly believe
in the sanctity of gibberish and when I was a child,
I wanted to believe in it too. So I prayed for it
and it was given and I felt no different.
I prayed in tongues for a great revelation
in the backseat of my parents’ car. For God
to use me for whatever will he may have.
My father flipped on the stereo. I stared out
at the night sky for an answer as I prayed.
All I saw were stars. All I heard was the car
as we moved, my parents talking, the radio.
I must have sounded like a muffled duck
with my head bowed and eyes closed. Not so different,
I imagine, from the prayers of augur priests
who took the auspices, men who believed God’s will
was in the birds. In their songs. In their tongues.
The four horsemen are coming, sang the birds.
The seven seals will be broken, replied the crows.
We will take the mark of the Antichrist or die
a horrible death, proclaimed the augurs.
The sewers run red with blood, says NPR and I
can see the bodies on the news. My God, the hawks
foretold this and no one listened. We both heard
their rasping screams. We saw them dive together
for their prey. We were shocked at the meaning of it.
Don’t you remember, Lord? You were right there
next to me. You gripped my hand and held your breath.
