The Hunt

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Listen to furious, frustrated wail,
Loping littoral trackers on blood scent,
Beating sticks, screaming chanting calls,
Metrical thrums on sinew taut skins.
Driving closer to proper deeply dug pit,
Attempting to entrap inhuman calls,
Camouflaged with leaf and dry branch,
Warrior baited, most tempting of live lures,
Hopes that their prey will stumble,
Rear in anger, strike out, flint-pierced,
 

Stumble, fall, agony, as spikes lash into flesh,
To never again threaten tribe’s sanctity.
In desperate defense, utters deceptive cries,
Leading them astray, but in terror, turns
Triumphant sounds in distant dawn haze,
As hunters uncover hidden nestlings,
Discover indefinable ecological niche,
Defenseless, mewling kits, amid alien corn,
Alone, blind, naked in unsuckled fear,

Worthy of primal, public sacrifice.
 

Harboring unknowable meaning,
Misbegotten worship offered,
Shrouded in shamanistic mysteries,
To insatiable, literal man-created gods
Though not gross beast itself, nits’ still
A start to destroying last of omnivorous brutes.
Offer their blood, tan their newborn hides,
String young carcasses as protective talismans,
Outside crude wattle-and-daub huts
As mute warning, warding off evil spirits.