Doberman Pharoah

To and fro, through freeze and thaws From zenith to nadir The universal tug of war Saw lines drawn in the sands appear Divisions of a promised land And Hell for those that dwelt Beneath a Pharaoh's granite hand Where death wed something else Millennia swam passed Since the covened Ark Ran aground on Ararat But anew, tempered shadows grew Out of Midian, strewing fear Over verdant lawns, the resurgent storms Led a desert son to sear From the palace orchard I espied (Where swooning trees and moonless beams vied For the painted eye of the royal bride Whose gliding curves were deified) ...beyond Her grace where love would die Wretched destiny arrive Back and forth the prophet came Riddled with a tongue of plagues That would render might Egypt lame If the rage of God stayed unassuaged I listened with a heavy heart But unveiled to the threats This Hebrew in a jackal's mask Would dredge into effect Thenceforth the Nile reddened S if Set stretched His hand To beset the damned And bruised with flies The skies grew leadened But these miracles, feared Were all but reared By nature, whose law alone Stood that revered This hysteria passed, but still the mark Of Yahveh burned on in the dark One final time, on the steps to the shrine Of Thoth, I twined with fate "Let my people go" "Still my word is no" "Then Death shall be the deciding plague" Since the crimes divine I left behind I'd warred with every tribe that plied In holy vestament, but with time Bored sore of clawing what was mine I laid my bones and made my throne With a view to paradise Thenceforth the heavens deafened As if great beasts Were unleashed to feast on man And with carrion span Michael was weaponed To descend with scorn A dark reform Through Pi-Ramses Skinning mine and Her firstborn Thus suspiria passed each sacred mark Of Yahveh, bleeding in the dark With nauseous dawn, a cry, forlorn Unified from plazas deep The prophet's curse Far worse had worked To wrest the war in me from sleep Drowned in light, a downward light Bathed the snaking exodus Through the wilderness As the Aeons crept Impressed with fresh bloodlust