by 
I saw you walking through the charnel house,
harvesting the bleached and disarticulated bones
of our ancestors to make our rote Sunday soup
Nights, you hung lifeless prayer from rotting teeth
At dawn you regurgitated the remains and our
foremothers spoke sadly of disease and diaspora
I wept to know how you suffered for your fantasies
We are left spineless and bloodless by our history
Crowned with the prickly thorns of your illusions,
you were greatly given to infusions of wine and bread
and daily rosaries traded for the remission of sins,
the very ones you would indulge again …
Now I know these bargains are Faustian and that
a puppet dancing in the dark has many lies to tell
©2014, poem, Jamie Dedes, All rights reserved; photo – a Greek charnel house – by Tom Oats under CC BY SA 3.0
WEDNESDAY WRITING PROMPT
Ideals, religious or otherwise, are they a matter of heart or of rote repetition and habit, fatuous fixation or even fetishism? Sometimes there is depth and understanding of history, traditions and traditional wisdom. Sometimes not. Post your thoughts in prose or poem or a link to your work in response to this prompt in the comment section below. Responses to Wednesday prompts are published the following Tuesday on The Poet by Day.
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Jamie Dedes' THE POET BY DAY Webzine 
My first response Jamie
#The grave of darkness #
The brightest of lights is obscuring my vision ,
An aroma of darkness is permeating my vein,
Please -come as storm addicted to rain and thunderbolt ,
I have kept my tears in a camouflaged hide in dew drops over grassy lawns ,
Craving the dumb show be arranged as a farewell through the last faraway train,
I’m waiting lonely for your storm in this dark station
Descrying a tormentor’s kick in an impoverished stomach ,
My acoustics is shattered in lakhs with a cramped girl’s cry ,
And witnessing to a stabbed sanguineous boy
lying down on the railway line ;
A demon of darkness is swallowing me wholly ,
Is everyone born deaf ,dumb and blind ?
None has illuminated a flare,
Whistles of the trains reverberating through the night are no more greeted ;
Perhaps one more corse
or corpses would be waiting to be evacuated ,
I’m scaring of the fair of sky burial
And eagerly waiting for your storm with celestial light and pearly raindrops,
As I’m encountering a gloomy grave frantic for drops of blood .
Kakali Das Ghosh
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Hi Jamie,
Here’s my third response:
A Toleration
So I says to our Vicky
” ‘ow come thas back so soon lass.”
Well she were in a right towing.
says “I were right with him, only he weren’t with me, the wazzock.”
Well, I like a strong fella, misen,
makes us all soft inside and tha feels cossetted, but when as they start, demanding tha do this or that.
It’s a right pisser.
That lad, Olly, asking to wed her,
says to her, ” I think it best love, as tha abandon this pagan stuff so we’ve a regular going on.”
Vicky says, “I’ll not abandon my faith,
and that of folk afore me.
I don’t want thee to abandon thy Christian doings, either.” Understanding his predicament, like.
Well, laddo, sloshes her int face
with his glove. Tosser.
Well, she slaps him back,
as you would, and
comes back home, quicksticks.
Tha can only tolerate so much.
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👏
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Liked your poem here. How the words intertwine and reveal is wonderfully done. You can see my post at https://reneejustturtleflight.com/2017/08/20/stained-glass-windows. Be well.
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Asphyxiation
The jungle crow is truthful. When he caws, he is the grandfather
and great grandfather too. The soul doesn’t differentiate between
male bodies charred at different times. The feminine rots to mute dust.
The rat snake and the cobra are slinky eyes
crawling over female forms-young, widowed or both
Fertile coconut palms brood over the misogynist terrain
The curry leaf plant recognizes friend from foe. The *Koovalam
disapproves of monthly spurts. The lemon tree withers away
upon female touch but is immune to bird eggs in its straggly, green shirt
The kitchen steps face south. I must not sit there, elbows on knees
or chin in hand. It is mourning that they fear here, more than death.
I will lie in the clearing, strangled by the vengeful biota
and the temple priest will chant mournful curses to free the trees
-Reena Prasad
(*Koovalam = stone apple tree)
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Fantastic poem!!! Ground shaking poem!!!
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Thank you!
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Hi, Jamie
Here is my view about ideals, history, ideologies and other concepts like these….
We are spinning endlessly
Around the sun
A sun who
From time to time is hiding under the moon
Probably he is bored too
History, a book of tales
Bible, a book of tales
Ideologies, some well sewn tales
Why do they feed us with tales
Are they responding to a need
Our need?
The need to fill the time between two blinks of the sun…
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Third response –
. magna carta .
is left behind with tiny writing. salisbury cathedral.
the back way. written in latin for those who matter.
those words and those words
an historian uttered sent me reeling outside.
where air is cleaner.
oh , by the way
left you both there too. were you trying to appease
the barons?
sbm.
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Second response
.. cooking carrots, and thinking of belief ..
the other side of the mirror
orange.
it is a source of inspiration, and research. it is written, yet having writ. we use. imagination, add a dose of suggestion, slightly thinking this is fact we do not move on when perhaps we should. so moving on quickly……
cut them.
maybe we need to check our numbers at the end, see if one or more are missing. need to count them carefully, one side then the other.it is all a pattern, that keeps us safely, leads us onward.
simmer them.
what about this list, to do it before you die, well as she said, you probably can’t do it after. some may disagree – another belief. we try not to judge, yet that bucket was not worth five pound,so
we paid two.
strain them.
ready for later.
sbm.
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Thanks Jamie……
my first response
“1712 we write of wool”
again, and weaving.
listen to the coventry carole,
little tiny child, fingers tapping
in time, the medieval, the membrance
of cathedral . walking up hill chanting.
repeatedly. they moved the stairs.
we hold the cotton, the wool
for comfort.
sbm.
white linen
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Hi Jamie,
This is my second response:
A Bridge
anastomosis [ah-nas″to-mo´sis] (pl. anastomo´ses) (Gr.)
It is bin day. Sound of breaking glass.
A vein.
between places,
one person and another,
A Bridge
anastomosis [ah-nas″to-mo´sis] (pl. anastomo´ses) (Gr.)
It is bin day. Sound of breaking glass.
A vein.
between places,
one person and another,
you and your kids,
a busy crossing between beliefs.
from wick to ash.
full to empty.
Broken, blocked, under investigation.
No link, information dammed,
Adamant your side is right,
other side apostate.
Bloodied metal sends a message,
via media bridges.
Bins must be wheeled back to their places.
a busy crossing between beliefs.
from wick to ash.
full to empty.
Broken, blocked, under investigation.
No link, information dammed,
Adamant your side is right,
other side apostate.
Bloodied metal sends a message
via media bridges.
Bins must be wheeled back to their places.
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Hi Jamie,
Here’s my first response:
Red The Strong Says
“Belief is a ship
on the fish flecked sea,
close hauled and tacking,
against this Christian gust.
It has a dragon’s head,
and aft a crook, which turns up,
and ends in a dragon’s tail.
Gilded carved work on each side
of the stem and stern.
I call this ship “The Serpent”
Its hoisted sails are dragon’s wings.
I’m brought before me boss,
who offers me baptism.
“And,” says he, “I will not
take thy property from thee,
but rather be thy mate,
if thou wilt make thysen
worthy to be such.”
I exclaim with all me might
against his offer, say
“I’ll never believe in Christ,
and this so called God.”
Boss was wroth, and says “Thee
shall die worst of deaths.”
He orders I be bound
to a beam of wood, me face
uppermost, and round pin of wood
set between my teeth
to force me gob open.
Boss orders an adder
rammed down my gob,
but adder shrinks back
when I breathe against it.
A hollow branch of angelica root
is stuck in my gob; others say boss
put his horn into me mouth,
and forces adder in
holds a red-hot iron
before me open gob.
So adder creeps into it,
down me throat,
gnaws its way out me side.
My last breath is a ship
on the fish flecked sea,
close hauled and tacking,
against this Christian gust.”
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