Collected Poems Anthony Burgess (best pdf reader for ebooks txt) 📖

bronze,

Was carried about the town that day, drums beating,

Trumpets and shawms braying, flutes cooing,

Some of his votaries drunk, all half-naked,

Honouring the god. Two Israelite officers,

Biting their lips, watched the procession,

Looking for – ‘An abomination,’ said one.

‘Look at them – look at that couple there.’ – ‘I see them’,

The other said, seeing them. ‘But what can we do?

The Moabites are not our responsibility.’ –

‘But those are’, said the first, pointing. ‘Look at them.’

Israelites, drunk and gay, dancing along.

‘Some of ours’, said the other. ‘I see what you mean.

But can we make an arrest? Now?’ The first one gloomed,

Envy perhaps in his gloom. ‘I see what you mean.

They’d tear us to pieces, man.’ As night fell,

The Moabites set up their bronze Ba’al high on a plinth,

And the revellers danced about, in contrary circles,

A contradance, singing something filthy and ancient,

Ending exhausted on the sward, any with all,

Man with boy with woman with man with, not too exhausted

To frot away, very holy work, while the god grinned.

But in daylight, in the garden of the temple,

Jasmine, oleander, fountains, birdsong,

Zimri saw holiness of a different order,

Walking, fingers entwined, with Cozbi, saying:

‘Why was I so slow in learning?’ – ‘You were not slow.’ –

‘I mean, I mean, why did it never occur to me,

Or to any of our people, that truly we worship

A god of misery, a god who hates all joy?

I see the truth clearly now. A god descended

When first we lay together, and it was not our God,

Not the God of the Israelites. Yet this god,

Or goddess as it may be, is a true god,

Laughing, benign…’ – ‘The god will descend again,

Any time we call on him – or her’,

Cozbi said, ‘for Ba’al is both she and he,

Mother and father, taking a lover’s lineaments,

All things to us.’ He embraced her lovingly,

Saying: A new misery torments me.

You will leave me. You will give yourself to others.’

She said: ‘That may seem strange to you. To us

It is a sacred duty.’ – ‘But, beloved, might it not be

A duty more sacred to be my love, my one love?

If there is a god of love, there must also be

A god of marriage.’ – ‘The gods’ she said, ‘do not

Concern themselves with marriage. Marriage is for

The making of children, the fixing of – what is the word?’

He said: ‘Inheritances. Land. Wealth. Cattle.

Maintaining the power of a family. That is true.

But I have seen with my own eyes a god shine out

From the bodies of girls and boys who have entered marriage.

She said: ‘For how long? The god yawns after a time

And then departs. Or he reveals himself

As a god of bitterness. In our temple

There is only the ecstasy.’ – ‘But you,’ he said,

‘You are not just the vessel of the ecstasy.

You are yourself – you are my one dear love.

Love is not something out there, not a passage of joy,

Between people who have no names. Love is ourselves.

Love is a word invented for us and us only.

The god is alive when you and I

Lie embraced, alone, the world shut out.’

She said: ‘Our high priestess would call that heresy.’

But he: ‘Yet she would smile when saying the word,

As you are smiling now.’ So they embraced,

And his eyes watered with love, his limbs trembled.

While out there, in the city, a great banquet

In honour of Ba’al proceeded – spitting roasts,

Wine spilling. ‘Eat,’ cried the host. ‘Eat ye.

For this is the very flesh of the god Ba’al,

Whose name be blessed in the ten worlds for ever.

Eat, eat, and do homage, for he is here

In the flesh of the lands and seas, in the birds that sing,

In the beast that grunt, in the armoured fish of the waters.

Eat, eat: do homage to his greatness.’

And they ate and belched their praise. Moses heard of it,

Moses heard all from the moral patrols and cried:

‘Every abomination that defiled them

With the worship of the golden calf – worse, you tell me,

Since they are eating of filthy forbidden flesh –

Scavengers of the sea, filled with dirt,

Pig-flesh, milk and flesh-meat in the one vessel.

Who has allowed this to happen? Speak. Who?’

And he looked at Joshua, Caleb, Eleazar,

The patrol-leaders, but none said anything,

And their silence was in manner of a rebuke.

Sighing, he said: ‘It is, at the last, myself –

The bad shepherd who has let the lambs go astray.

I have had a bereavement to suffer, a black season

Of mourning and solitude. But Joshua, my son,

You who must take up the rod of office, you

Who must bear the burden of leadership, Joshua,

How is it possible?’ Joshua spoke softly.

‘There were reports of particular transgressions.

Action was taken. As for the recent events –

Information was slow in coming. We had no

Word from Zimri. We understood all was well,

More or less well. Odd acts of delinquency.

But nothing that seemed to require major action.’

Moses said: “Where is Zimri?” – ‘No one knows.

We surmise that he may have been killed, because of his zeal.

They are an unruly people, the people of Moab.’

Moses said: ‘He was of good family.

I knew his father well. Honest, steadfast,

Pious. Now, Joshua, what do you propose?’

Joshua said: ‘Some of our erring people

Have already come home, ashamed and sick.

Ready for punishment. I suppose we must march in,

Ferret out the others. Or perhaps show

Our power and our righteousness. Punish the whole town.

Massacre. Set fire to it. Though, to speak truly,

We have had enough of such wholesale slaughter.’

Moses said: ‘The time for a judgement on Moab

Must come later, come in the Lord’s own time.

Meanwhile, our punishments for our erring sons

Must be’, he said, ‘exemplary.’ – ‘Exemplary – how?’ –

Moses said: ‘The word will come to me.

I fear it will be a harsh word.’ Harsh word, harsh,

And more than a harsh word. Cozbi was weeping

In Zimri’s arms, in the room of a squalid inn.

He said, not unhappily: ‘Punishment

For loving too well. Or it may be a reward.’

She said: ‘I was always told,’ then she wept again,

‘It was not for the weak of heart.’ But he said: ‘Strong,

Strong of heart. Is not this love of ours

Better, holier, than all that nonsense of the temple,

That wickedness of the temple?’ She spoke