đź•Ż The Sundown of the Gibbor: A Lament Upon the High Place đź•Ż
(A Vision in the Waning of Tekufat Tammuz)
Lo, the sun goeth down upon blood-stained stone,
And setteth not in glory—but in grief.
Upon the far-off mount of Bashan lieth still
That one whom men of dust called Rephaim.
His bones are long as cedars cleft and crowned,
His sighs are caverns hollowed in the wind.
Yea, Tekufat Tammuz returneth once again—
The turning of the year when shadows thrice extend,
When watchers veil their faces in the west,
And time forgetteth what it dared to name.
The children of Anak pass not this way,
For the breath of him that sleepeth burneth the path.
Call him not by name, O wanderer: beware—
His name is writ in lightning and sealed beneath the flood.
Some named him Ar’khan of the Eastern Winds,
Others, Yedidor the Hewer, or the First Wept Flame.
But he hath no name among the living—
Only among the stars that fell with him.
He was a king ere kings had tongues to speak,
His crown a ring of thorns and dawning fire.
The mountain groaneth ’neath his dreadful rest,
And trees grow crooked on his ancient brow.
Only a remnant—seers and ruined priests—
Know what he resteth on, and dare not say.
For he sleepeth not on stone, nor common soil,
But upon that which was the altar of the sky:
A shard of firmament, rent once by flame,
Where the oaths of the Watchers cracked and died.
Beneath him, the broken vow lies still—
Above him, silence clothed in God.
O Gibbor! Thy day is swallowed in the deep.
Thy sons are scattered dust on Edom’s wind,
And thy daughters—
Their songs are heard in dreams of madmen now.
Rest, thou fallen flame, rest.
The sun goeth down upon thee—forever.
Written by Marguerite Grace
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