The Balmorhea Prophecies

[Twelve sheets of hand-written text on vellum found, 2007, rolled in a wax-sealed Pony Express map case at the bottom of San Solomon Spring, Balmorhea, Texas. Scratched into the wax was the date "1878" and the initials "CKL". We have numbered the quatrains in the order in which they were stored. Even a cursory examination reveals fairly obvious references to events and personages already known to us. Closer study indicates levels of encryption whose depths we have been unable to plumb fully.]

       Parve – nec invideo – sine me, liber, ibis in urbem:
       ei mihi, quod domino non licet ire tuo!
                                                               —Ovid.

       Si dolce e’l tormento.
                            —Monteverdi.

       Durch alle Töne tönet
       im bunten Erdenträume
       ein, nur ein leiser Ton gezogen,
       für den, der heimlich lauschet.
                                    —Friedrich Schlegel.


I.
Knowing neither the Night from which they come
nor the Pit to which they go the little Hitlers like Father like Son
strut and smirk as Babylon screams
and Towers fall before the rising Sea.

II.
Besmirched by Blood pale with Bully’s Fear
as azure Diamonds sparkle where Buffaloes
once roamed Eden shivers and bakes and shakes
as Emerson walks incredulous mongst the Sharks.

III.
Two Trees Fronds adroop stand
beside the southern Sea await
ing New Atlantis’s Rearisal
root bound in poisoned Sand.

IV.
Out the Sea by the Eights they come like Jackals
hairy water mouthed and ravenous
for fuzzy pubed Youth of every Stripe
garlanded in Fuchsia or not.

V.
Not the Unio out of Triune
but Uno de Seis will stand
and breathe when new Numbers
come tumbling from the brownish Sky.

VI.
Thrice crowned thrice coward the three legged Beast
comes trundling cross the Saint’s
Isthmus in a Rain of green Beetles
whose Sheen lights the way back to Baal.

VII.
Mired in thawing Peat Tulips
suck Grosgrain Sausages made
Mama’s way from Pork
Belly Atoms afloat off Wyoming’s hoary Coast.

VIII.
On Lucifer’s old Highway titanium Monsters
their bifurcate Growl a distant Echo
lost to all sit empty but for Bones
awaiting the dewy Rust that never comes.

IX.
Ten Behemoths with their Lightning sharp
Cloud Claws squeeze Earth’s Pimples white
and coal dark in whose running Pus
heartless warped Heads scream for Night to come.

X.
Seventeen Lights of Peace flicker faintly across
the Globe a few then burn steady
and bright as some see first
beyond Two and then mirabile dictu One.

XI.
Seven Cultures mixed black blue
green red and white take eighteenth Wing and search
for fresh Carrion where once Nightingales sang
and Peacocks flung Rumi’s Rainbows to Heaven.

XII.
Fifty three stretched Swarves clad only in silver
stud Chaps bestride the World spraying
it with their little Things now squatting to mark
with stinking brown Rose Petals Satan’s Path.

XIII.
What’s a Sunflower or thirteen to do on the Day
of twenty nine Sunrises but turn
and turn and turn in Eons’ old Con
fidence the Morrow will bring but One?

XIV.
Thirty one gaunt Hounds race Seventy four Waves.
Four and forty Horsemen awake at last
on Everest’s green Slopes and head for Home while
two Gnus bust a Serengeti Gut.

XV.
Wild and willful reborn Mozart bearing nineteen Staves
clutches a mere Handful of Salt and seeks
a Mountain Fortress where again
he can seek to sing the lost last Songs.

XVI.
Forty seven Virgins caper on the Slopes of Ararat
longing for lost Etna and Krakatoa too
but delighted to be safe at last from hoodless
Beasts of false Burden and Neanderthal DNA.

XVII.
In Realms of former glory Bands of twinkling Fair
ies dance fortnightly all agossip about
the Moon now full now half full hardly noting
the absent Hordes of deaf Neanderthals.

XVIII.
With Seven beside Eight beside Nine
supported by Two Cloud Palaces
finally meet and mingle while
false Truce Flags flutter furiously.

XIX.
Two legged Dogs caper elevens wise
round Four Bonfires marking the Earth
calling it theirs yapping first at
the Flames then at the unassailable new Night.

XX.
Withal the once fatuous Scientist
sits on his Hands the better
to contemplate the ruins of Continents
and the bracing triumph of Air.

XXI.
Light Trails of co existent coeval
Creatures flash across wine dark
Skies leaving Shards of Hubris crunch
ing under the calloused Feet of false Pans.

XXII.
Angry Gods descend in Tens and gorge
themselves gross—squared white
mushroom leaving only the red capped
spotted with Sperm for Survivors.

XXIII.
After a June when the last Bells toll
Pennywhistles turn to Rust and Ivory
Keys to white Must what’s left
for newly minted Minds but to sing?

XXIV.
Amongst th’enfolding Strata
if One collapse or become diseased
a subtle Shift ensues for the Multiverse
like a Poet so abhors the vacuous.

XXV.
Hallowed Ground’s not blood soaked—
Cairo’s Wits know that—merely
tinged Pink till the silent Sea
comes to cleanse it of us.

XXVI.
Dark Princes Codpieces all abulge
descend from rock Mountain high
Alpine Aeries and Himalayan Havens
and sink traceless in the New Sahara.

XXVII.
Four becomes Two Two becomes comfortably
Naught Scimitar Scythe Crux crooked and
Six thrice rent Flotsam on the heaving Bosom
and copious Tears of the of the forlorn Mother.

XXVIII.
Once brilliantine blue the proud Orb spins on
and on as ever awaiting twice told Healing
to come as ever from the very Stars and quench
the terrible Ugliness of Halogen Haze.

XXIX.
Moles beckon to the Still unblind
who eclipsed burrow deep and live
on borrowed Time where Seasons fade
and new Salendars lie badly on Rock Walls.

XXX.
Bearing Iguanas he comes from One
limping marries Two and near
Sunset waves varied flags of Victory
o’er Seven score and three invisible Enemies.

XXXI.
Neath mauve Clouds rent by red Lightning
lovely Pests take Wing through empty Halls
of justice gorged and gorging on
famous Milch Cows Stud Stallions.

XXXII.
How many Days must pass they scream
after burning all the Corpses in Town Squares
before he returns and still they scream
even as the last Farewell Sun sets.

XXXIII.
Rumors spread that Children now born
silent once rightly screamed on entering
this World where Night reigns and Day itself
is but a thrice told Tale of gullible Fools.

XXXIV.
After Twelve times Twelve times Twelve years
one in a Thousand still still dreams in Rhymes
and wakes to clutch Ghost Pens and
unblooded Bones of Trees’ Skeletons.

XXXV.
Eight becomes accursed first then Nine
then Six then all Digits Deathbringers all
so counting stops and then Words first
written then spoken fall by the hard way.

XXXVI.
On the eighth Day water runs
uphill Sunflowers track the Moon
and Animals of the same Species
no longer recognize each other.

XXXVII.
After a Season without Sunrise
a dark Chasm opens in the Minds
of Men. Some few bridge it some
fly over it most deny its Existence.

XXXVIII.
Across the Chasm lie new Edens
with attendant Snakes and tasty
Apples. As before Access comes
to those who wait out Floods and such.

XXXIX.
Beware Echoes from dying
Mouths and misborn Missives.
How can a Ship of Shards take us
anywhere but the wrong Shore?


XL.
Diamonds lie embedded here
and there that cut and burn
greedy Fingers palliative
only to the remote rare Pure.

XLI.
On the fourth try Ouroborus
vomits his Tail the Phoenix
is fresh out of Tender
and Hamlet ponders his own empty Skulls.

XLII.
Revolution comes: one way Signs
are banned Landfills are free
of Foreskins and Banners of Pink
and Mauve fill Tiananmen Square.

XLIII.
The three horned Beast again
defiles the Earth whose slack
Teat Hands hang limp sore from the Suck
of Ten Thousand Magpie Maggots.

XLIV.
Sunward Tics permanently
Till able Soils Moebius Stars
transparent Clothes and Minds
open open open open.

XLV.
Bach snickers Handel is miffed
Beethoven sneezes Alkan can’t.
Their Stave Strata their Notes Stones
their Rests all artfully lovelily false.

XLVI.
Bluer Earths are better and
greener too breeding bluer
Children and greener too less
prone to eating each other.

XLVII.
Watch O watch from this Mount
how the once darkling Plain
lightens as long hidden Seeds
sprout and make the Desert green.

XLIX.
Golgotha? A Pimple beside your new
mountain of Five Billion Skulls.
Clamber down start anew and this
Time try do try to remember.

L.
In angry spade like Ships they return
because they say you mock
and revile them. Betimes they go
busy on further Flights of Fancy.

LI.
Off world Star Ruts fill with cosmic
Mud from cosmic Deluges while Stragglers
re mound the Mons Veneris and pre
putial Envoys doff their mitred Masks.

LII.
With May gone May Poles vanish in silent Skies
Diamond Rivers flow to encrusted Seas
while from the Graves of Eighty seven Prophets
rises the toxic Stench of age old Self delusion.

LIII.
Juggernauts of Greed disguised
as religions sink at last in
their Mountains of Offal where
Butterflies of Mystery applaud quietly.

LIV.
The Circle is squared the Angle
trisected the negative Root
made One when the fifth Zephyr
wafts Parsecs of Blessings o’er Olympus’ white Head.

LV.
Invisible Lilacs bloom fruitlessly
every fifth Try with fangless
Serpents coiled frying round
their Seventeen hollow Roots.

LVI.
Boom! Boom! Ancient Thunders
come again and by thirds and eighths
distant old Lightning stirs anew
the almost sterile Crucible.

LVII.
The Day that was Night becomes
the Night that was Day Mother
Father Father Mother and thrice sundered
Tribes seek dry Shelter offstage.

LVIII.
Stars fall upward seaward sideways.
Crosses crumble Scimitars rust.
Books bloat the Stomachs of Worms which burst
to the Delight of listening Cliffs and lisping Loons.

LIX.
Rutted Minds call their Nightmares
Progress and teach the Last of
the rutting Students that Walt and Will
and Wake and Wudan Li and Qi are evil.

LX.
Blackpool Levandra Malachi
where Gods sleep again and
Fishes play mongst scattered
Skulls and an Everest of burnt Books.

LXI.
On the fortieth Day after a Gaggle
of Decades Fourteen Women storm
the Gates of Heaven and Hera
opes the Highroad to the Stars.

LXII.
The Great Twilight then when
the Stars themselves are gone
the Great Night and for
those with inner Ears the Great Silence.

LXIII.
Read if you will Times and Places Doers and Deeds
in these Letters and Rows and Rhymes
distant and near obscure and clear
to find a Way again to the uncleft Home.