{"id":5067,"date":"2016-01-30T15:48:54","date_gmt":"2016-01-30T15:48:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/?p=5067"},"modified":"2016-02-28T16:29:53","modified_gmt":"2016-02-28T16:29:53","slug":"tenochtitlan-a-poem-by-robin-ouzman-hislop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artvilla.com\/plt\/tenochtitlan-a-poem-by-robin-ouzman-hislop\/","title":{"rendered":"Tenochtitlan. A Poem by Robin Ouzman Hislop."},"content":{"rendered":"

 <\/p>\n

Who is to say?
\n 
\nO Tenochtitlan, lake city
\nof floral rooftops, white washed walls
\ntrim green gardens, aqueducts
\n& clean swept alleyways
\n 
\nthat you should fall
\n 
\nto ruin
\nto colossal wreck.<\/em>
\n 
\nYour God’s cruel laughter
\nruler of havoc, chaos, destruction
\nthat final mockery
\nyou knew too well
\nto shelter from
\ncity of magic, bathed in blood.
\n 
\n*
\n 
\nWho is to say?
\n 
\nAn Aeon
\n 
\na fated sun in its fifth heaven
\nthe prophecy must be fulfilled
\n 
\nwhen they came with their plague, their lust
\nto tread your sacred warrior
\nblood matted hair, immersed in feculence
\nen plein air<\/em> of unassuaged sacrifice, into dust
\nnot a death of feathers & flowers.
\n 
\n*
\n 
\nWho is to say?
\n 
\nAs you tossed your hapless
\nvictim’s corpse, gouged heart devoured
\non the sacrificial stone slab, down
\nthe great pyramid steps to the suffering poor beneath.
\n 
\nYour captive, who was your self
\nwhose steps you’d rehearsed, unto their final agony.
\n 
\nWhose flesh, prohibitive for you, you must share
\nin scattered pieces on the base maize porridge
\nin your neighbours’ clean kept homes<\/p>\n