Avoiding the Gods by Ian Abbot

They have come
to scald our blood, to call us out
from our bright houses to the twisted shadows under trees.
Let us not listen to them. Do not let them in.

There beyond the darkened garden, in the obscure forest,
the night expends itself in numberless small deaths.
That is the way of them, the way of predators. A kind
of innocent destruction
but destruction nonetheless.

Let us abandon them
to moulder on their crosses,
beat their iron wings; to redeploy their armies and invent
new forms of sinning and guilt.

Let us remain here, calmly
taking bread, and wine, and speech.
And in the morning
take our limbs to work, and walk behind
the swaying, fuming breath of cattle.

And let us look for our salvation
in the language we have come to teach ourselves.

From: https://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/poem/avoiding-gods/

Date: 2015 (published)

By: Ian Abbot (1947-1989)