WC Roberts
The Honored
raise
high
the blade,
plunge it down
honor to the gods
sated only by a child’s heart
lift high this offering; sing solemn supplications
the priest in green feather boa
gives the climate change
his blessing,
harvest
of
skulls
blood
flows
along
the altar
channels, gathering
so we drink in the ritual
lift high the offering; sing solemn supplications
let the people hear the prayer
—see the offering
supplicate
to the
white
worm
Quetzalcoatl’s children
_______________
WC Roberts lives in a mobile home up on Bixby Hill, on land that was once the county dump. The only window looks out on a ragged scarecrow standing in a field of straw and dressed in WC’s own discarded clothes. WC dreams of the desert, of finally getting his first television set, and of ravens. Above all, he writes, and has had poems published in Strange Horizons, Apex, Space & Time Magazine, Shock Totem, Abyss & Apex, Scifaikuest, Star*Line, and others.
Editor’s Notes: This Fibonacci series* poem addresses the sacrifice rituals to Quetzalcoatl, a fire-plumed serpent in Central America mythology (http://www.mythencyclopedia.com/Pr-Sa/Quetzalcoatl.html, see also http://www.lacma.org/art/exhibition/children-plumed-serpent-legacy-quetzalcoatl-ancient-mexico). The image of the serpent comes from Wiki in Amino (another version of this serpent is used for the Abyss & Apex Magazine logo image).
* In mathematics, the Fibonacci numbers are the numbers in the following integer sequence, called the Fibonacci sequence, and characterized by the fact that every number after the first two is the sum of the two preceding ones: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34… (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fibonacci_number) . In this poem, each line contains a Fibonacci number of syllables successively sequenced up then down and repeated again, ending in a single 8-syllable word.
