SONNET DARE: In Which Enceladus Has Something Still Lacking

Gigantes don't just happen; they must grow
And growing boys need lots and lots of food.
Enceladus, for instance, don't you know
Would find it more than just a little rude
Were he deprived of his burrito fix,
Though he be circling Planet Saturn as
A rocky little moon -- he's number six
In size. And he was never killed; it has
Been told Athena threw a mighty spear
And felled him, but that's far from true as we
Well know; he's out there shining, cold and clear
And with a nice supply of water. He
Just needs some feeding up. A Taco Bell
Would fit the bill. I know he'd find it swell.

In Which I Dive Into The Story Of The Stone

An image now infests my teeming mind --
Not of the bugs that friends of mine expect,
But just one thing: a stone that one might find
Beside a road somewhere. 'Twas a reject
When Nu-Wa rebuilt heaven, but her hand
Imbued it with rare life. It's not unique
To Western tropes, this notion of the grand
Raised from the lowly, mighty from the weak.
Our psalms make it the capstone; Xuecin Cao
Gives it a soul and sends it through the world
To learn of love and pain and, perhaps, how
To make sense of illusions that have swirled
Around us all, right from our helpless birth.
The Story of the Stone roots me to Earth.

In Which I Ponder Some New Kind Of Slaughter

Sonneteer's note: The full title of the graphic novel reviewed here is Some New Kind of Slaughter - or - Lost in the Flood (And How We Found Home Again): Diluvian Myths from Around the World (and you thought my titles were long!).

Did this ark save or just delay us, asks

Ziusudra, afloat amidst the flood

That haunts our legends, dramas, myths and masques.

Some New Kind of Slaughter does not, in blood,

But water drowns the world as tales unfold

From all times and all cultures. Noah's there,

Nuwa, Manu, Tamendonare, old,

Uncanny figures all, each comes aware

Of what's to come, as in our present day

One woman sees the facts of what we've done

And knows it all could happen just that way

To us. As stories twine we're watched by one

Great turtle, who'll inherit a wet world,

So Mann and Lewis' nightmare is unfurled.

For Bug Week: A Hymn To Be'gotcidi

Son of the Sun and trickster of our souls,

Be'gotcidi is Lord of the Insects,

A dirty god, as James Hillman extols

When he talks "Going Bugs" and the effects

These creatures have, in life and in our dreams.

Like these, his creatures, Be'gotcidi lands

Where'er he will, just to elicit screams --

Through us is how he souts -- as with his hands

He grabs at us to make us sing. Valery

In L'abeille knows this too, as he

Finds in a deadly, delicate small sting

Administered in warning by a bee

A "gold alarm" that is a wake-up call

To pay attention to the great and small.

In Which I Scoff Like A Nordic Atheist Would At These April Snowstorms

Three roosters have to crow in three locales:
Fjalar, Gullinkambi and the black,
Ere I start to believe those rationales
Which say that summer's never coming back.
Garmr's still chained and quiet in his pit,
And Jörmungandr's still wet and asleep!
Naglfar still is harbored and that shit,
Old Loki, still is chained up way down deep,
The serpent's venom burning up his face
When Sigyn pauses to clean up the mess.
No, there is still no cause for me to pace,
Though snow does stymie April's spring progress.
The three years' winter is not yet at hand;
No matter what the bards say 'round the land.