The End of a Universe
Here’s a puzzle, then:
not all of man’s gods live forever.
Just look to the failing light
at Orion’s shoulder, the shuddering
star by his knee.
But Orion was a man, wasn’t he?
Destined to decay in body
though sent to live in the
spangled mesh of sky.
What but imagination marks
the grave of the Hunter?
Even Heitsi-Eibib lay with
the stone of the Moon at his head.
It was a trick, until it was not--
and the hero of the Hottentots slept.
Khoikhoi, you said— the other is
an aberration, the name a
colonialist craft
on a moon that was never theirs.
It’s all fun and games
until the light goes out
and Betelgeuse spills red from
the arm of the chief.
Don’t you know anything? The rising sun in the east
reads
“here lies Dionysus dead, son of Semele”.