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sixthday
Judith Deem Dupree
The heavens still danced their primal dance-
still leapt and clashed and
never ceased their frenzy. But on this sixthday,
the sun in its pubescence breathed
its raw, hot breath toward one
singular ovum, and grasped for it with a roar
of fiery wings. From this birthling,
streaked with palpatant blue and pale sienna-
up from the stench and heat and vapor
of its birth-blood,
from the magma of its whelping, its begetting,
its expulsion-clouds arose, great
with hush, amassed in a gathered silence,
and circled there, hovering, touching awkwardly
the wonder of its unformed face . . .
and held it there, secreted-
wrapping it endlessly, caressing, cooling it with
soft and muffled fingers,
like a shadow weeping. And just before
the wash and rush of warm rain,
the heavens heaved a sigh; a Syllable slipped
off the tongue of God
and splashed upon the dust . . .
splashed like a Word of Life upon the dust.
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