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Experiment 5

Against Things Being What They Are

page 13

Against Things Being What They Are

Anna Livia Plurabelle
Mother of multiplicities
Nothing induces you to tell
The fates of Time's forgotten cities
Eaten alive or buried deep
The secret's bitter and will keep.

Heroes sprung from out your loins
Ready armed to do your bidding
Phalanx after phalanx join
Processional the reaper's wedding
Serve no more than shades or leaves
No-one recollects or grieves.

Earth's eternal Autumn mother
Genetrix of the unconscious
Tides of sleep that creep and smother
Natural law with Jungle Justice
Smile and turn upon your side
Another generation's died.

Eater of the living heart
Carrion goddess of content
I accept the sufferer's shirt
Hair-side inmost and dissent
And commit my mortal blood
Against your overwhelming flood.

To occupy a human place
In the failing scheme of things
And spit derision in the face
That encroaching darkness brings
Is not enough, but good, and all
A man may prize before his fall.

It's human he should disagree
And strive as though he yet can change
The face and fact of history
And in a new dimension range;
This stand I take and dearly sell
Anna Livia Plurabelle.

End piece by Barbara Moffat and Ross O'Rourke