In the days when we ate what we wanted to be
and appearances took us in
completely as houses

we asked the gods to visit and they came
with their animal faces, shaking
their manes of feather and fibre

and making their repeated claims
on us to honour and obey and feed
them some of us. Back then

it seemed a fair exchange, today
they give us nothing, not even
a song. We are grown thin with

not knowing what to want
to be: something swallowed stuck
in the gullet and will not move

no matter how we stamp
and clap each other
on the back and make the sounds

to call them down, they do not come.
What can we raise in their place?
The earth does not care

for our praise. Not one
face here will do the trick.
Whose hand will hook

the fishbone out? Who
can unblock the airway
between the gods and us?