Life hacks ...

He was the sort of man

who wouldn't hurt a fly.

Many flies are now alive

while he is not.

He was not my patron.

He preferred full granaries, I battle.

My roar meant slaughter.

Yet here we are together

in the same museum.

That's not what I see, though, the fitful

crowds of staring children

learning the lesson of multi-

cultural obliteration, sic transit

and so on.

I see the temple where I was born

or built, where I held power.

I see the desert beyond,

where the hot conical tombs, that look

from a distance, frankly, like dunces' hats,

hide my jokes: the dried-out flesh

and bones, the wooden boats

in which the dead sail endlessly

in no direction.

What did you expect from gods

with animal heads?

Though come to think of it

the ones made later, who were fully human

were not such good news either.

Favour me and give me riches,

destroy my enemies.

That seems to be the gist.

Oh yes: And save me from death.

In return we're given blood

and bread, flowers and prayer,

and lip service.

Maybe there's something in all of this

I missed. But if it's selfless

love you're looking for,

you've got the wrong goddess.

I just sit where I'm put, composed

of stone and wishful thinking:

that the deity who kills for pleasure

will also heal,

that in the midst of your nightmare,

the final one, a kind lion

will come with bandages in her mouth

and the soft body of a woman,

and lick you clean of fever,

and pick your soul up gently by the nape of the neck

and caress you into darkness and paradise.