Bad Timing for a Prophet

 

For seven years, he sat, squinting,

by the whispering waves of the sea-lagoon,

fingers playing with small hills and valleys

of a million purple-tinged shells,

stuttering at the fishermen’s questions

waiting for a voice – a sign.

 

Weary of the wet sand,

the sickly fruit of the tall trees,

he strode inland into the heat,

   as if he had a purpose,

held high a shard of Phoenician glass

as a charm against the sun god’s blazing chariot.

 

An acacia bush crackled as it caught the light,

miraculously twisted itself into spiny fire.

A dove shrilled as it flapped away           

in search of an outcrop or an olive tree

and a voice cried out:

 

“You have no branch or brand

to capture heat. Come back

when you have learned

to plan better.“

 

“P-p-prometheus seeks you, not I”

the man replied.     

 

“Ah.Ah..

The One you seek has no name you can say,

is no man-eater, no hairy teller of trashy riddles,

but a Fierce Spirit high in the barren mountains,

his imperial face more terrible than Medusa’s.”

 

He turned away, remembering

a bed of trampled bulrushes

by stinking trapped water,

wondering where the spirit could be

and how beautiful, how grand and never-ending

the distant land promised to some, and

held by others, must surely be.

 

The voice, now sad, called as it faded:

“He bullies and pities in equal measure” 

but the man did not hear the warning.                                         

​

 

David Allard, now retired from teaching English to asylum seekers and refugees, writes poems and short stories. Some of the work has appeared in USA and UK publications