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Our Lady of the Wastes: Strange Platypus(es)



 
I am a stranger here
Here
Where there is no water

We have water.
We hear the sound of it
Night and day, night and day
We hear

I am a Pilgrim here
In this waste
Where there are no trees

We have trees.
We hear them rustling in the breezes
Night and day, night and day
We here

And all the voices of the waste places cried:

Too Whoow Who
Too Whoow Who

Dryness, dust and bones
Dryness, dust and bones

Praise to the Serpents of the Wilderness
Glistening scales of concrete and steel
Holocausts of victims
Smoking in the sun
Shining in the moon
Drying
to dust and bones

Whoow Too
Whoow Too

Moloch and Hecate dance
Master of finance and Mistress of Changes
Praise and prosperity for
A hundred Cuylers and
A hundred wandering Phlebases
Children of desolate lands

Too Who
Too

Come and join us
Come and join us
Where the powers all are seated
Mistress Cathy’s on the organ
Brother John will preach the message
A reading from the text
of a Puritan diab’list:
Dia ad aghaidh’s ad aodann
Agus bas dunach ort!
Dhona’s dholas ort,
Agus leat-sa!
That is what they say I said

Too
To

Dayenu!

Where is the Lady of the city;
She who binds and she who looses?
Are her powers now all wither’d
By the breath of concrete serpents;
She who clothes herself in sunlight
Tramples on the disk of Hecate?

The owl of the waste place
Stands beside her spouse
The Dragon
They will bind her, they will eat her
Feed her to the concrete serpents

Dayenu!

By the Fire of Azusa
By the oil of the Stewarts
By the Love of Mother Horton
By the Yankee preacher’s message
By the Power of the Missions
Now unbind her gods of Edom

Dayenu!

Shall these bones live?
Shall these bones live?

Son of Man, Speak.
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