Porkopolis

Chimbu Wedding

• When the villagers stake out a hundred pigs
• and two men wade in with clubs,
• watch how they float, cold as light out of heaven,
• above the scene. When the pigs scream
• and buckle with their skulls caved in,
• remember that not one thing in this world
• will be spared. Not one leaf. Not one
• hair on a child's head. See the women
• hauling rocks to the fire-pits,
• the boys kneeling to collect blood
• in banana leaves, and think of St. Peter's
• vision: cloven-hoofed creatures descending
• on a sheet, the sky saying "Take, eat."
• Learn to sit in the smoke with hunger sated
• as children play with bladders they've inflated
• like balloons. Learn a new language
• for fellowship, and when you walk home
• through the fields see if you can translate
• the gloam-wrapped mountain's whisper
• as Come. Then, if there is a place
• prepared for the saints, you will know
• which way to turn at the crossroads.
• You will not trouble the angel at the garden
• gate for a way past her sword. You will
• not remember what blood washed you clean.