The Collected Poetry

According to Viper, Chapter 3: The Writing is Read

Psalm of the happy,

Song of the prince.

Death is a kindly fate!

One generation passes,

Another remains.

Remains by choice, is forced to remain.

Blessed be the builder,

Known be the buried.

I know of Imhotep,

I know of all kings.

Yet I follow the scent of joyous oils,

Therefore, live like the kings cannot.

And old Demodocus wailed and plucked his harp,

A foreigner in the land of the pharaoh,

Yet best-beloved, of the mistress of the west.

Saret! Saret! I hear it poured forth-

From the book of Coming Forth By Day-

The Emergence Into Light-

This chapter had no beginning.

In the center of yesterday the words began,

And continued not through tomorrow,

But through the end of time.

I, Harper, layman, sing:

the words inscribed first by the warriors,

Who boldly raised their spears aside of Horus.

Thoth the writer, the heretic.

A god most ancient before his knowledge reached Prometheus.

Hear his immortal paean

On the fifth day learn to perceive the gods:

Uncover the serpents blockade,

Cease the flowing of the Nile,

Unlock the hardest iron.

Slaughter the serpents, know this prayer.

In my own hand, Thoth

The most dangerous writing in the world.

I slept uneasily, for I am the serpent.

I sleep uneasy now, for I am to die.

The words that break the air like talons,

Though in gold leaf, and full of might,

Are the most improbable words that human souls

Could ever imagine.

Sleep is where Ma'at dare not preside,

Sleep is where the war is truly won.

The obelisk hearts, the drooped diamonds,

The Northern railways, the faces of black and grey.

I come to raise the revels,

And sing the revelations. I set the crown,

On the heads of the escaped.

Oh Absent king, your people

Crowd near Sinai. For you loved their fathers,

But you have grown industrious-

And live a melancholy life.

Where dust commands a workforce-

And drones direct the day.