Bias has for animals better named Beasts:
Creatures that could us shake in strong seats
They are the ones Satan ably schemes their use
In battles real rather than a ruse…
And he had been chiefly The Selective,
Their offices never The Elective;
A good distance keeps from one this hour
And the next is back for just its power…
For a combat The Beast usable,
Mostly one to Man unthinkable;
An increased tasking of The Reptilian,
Time and again contacting Mammalian…
The scaly slipperiness of snakes
Elusiveness matches that record breaks.
So, it had to be Snake at Eden
To help shape The Question he had asked then.
It was Christ who had Swine linked with him
In a sermon and a hostage to him
But Satan would sooner he wasted one
Than dispatched it to wars that must be won;
Yes, after him, God began to use Snake,
With it dealing with Jews who’d dared rake!
For disgrace of Stoned Godly Naboth dogs:
Nicer than further hitting corpse with logs;
For new slain Christians in fields vulture!
Does trust The Vulture’s Carrion culture…
And A Dragon for Mother and Child
Fire-spitting, Huge Success from being wild.
We never saw it coming
but it came
like the sound of the trumpet
heralding the doomsday-
that day, dark as the night
bereft of moon and stars,
that announced your departure.
You were a priest
that santa-claused without ceasing,
brightening every cloudy sky
you met with the sun.
Though separated are we
by the great river
you've crossed ahead of us,
we hope to meet you someday,
not on our side side of the river
in the world of wicked ones
radiating rotten rays
where Ahab robs Naboth
of his vineyard;
but on your side of the river
in the world of saints
united as a congregation
without a segregation,
filled with faces smiling,
free of faces frowning.
N.B. this poem is a tribute to late Father Barnabas Salawu
known to have devoted his life to caring for the poor. His last priestly
assignment was at Magongo,Kogi state, Nigeria before his death in
2011. R.I.P.
Looking for the formal definition, structure, and history of this poetry form? Visit the Poetry Dictionary entry below. Then return to explore how PoetrySoup members bring the form to life through their own poems.