Sacrifice

Sacrifice

© 2012 Diana Noquetzal Garcia

Spirits roam in their Aztec plummage
Upon the once blood-soaked sacrifical rocks
...Hoping to gather their essence that flowed out
As shamans dug their hands in flesh and sinew
To pull out beating dripping hearts
And raised them to obsidian moons
These one-time prisoners of the flowery wars
Flutes and drums and rattling bones
Call to ancient gods
In time of peace
In time of war
Only those with jaguar hearts
May cross the two paths
The two worlds
To eat
To gnaw
On the moist meaty minced human parts
Which will be infused with
The courage
The bravery
Of their enemies
To win more wars
Civilized wars
Of the flowery kind
To sing stories of the ancients
The Quetzalcoatl god,
The feathered serpent
Will return from the land of death
When the sacrifice calls
To greet the Morning Sun
To fill us all with its wisdom and light
But beware of his twin,
The shapeshifter
He will drag the screaming souls
In the opposite direction
Back to the pain of flesh
Being torn asunder
To begin the suffering
Once more