L’arche de Noé / Rampenbeheer

A collaboration with guest poet Drager Meurtant¹

Two by two they flowed into the ark
as the water flowed around the bow;
the animals bounding and sounding
their sounds, confused.

The botanist daughter, too
collected two of every twig and leaf
she found on the ground,
strewing them around

her lab, stewing some for tea
when living on virtue
turned tiresome.

Aye, holy books hold wisdom,
advising how to manage
threats of disaster,
(and the wholly world-wide web, too,
which shipboard spiders started spinning)

While some heroes take the
bold step to search for voices of the
ghosts of the dead in hell,
and learn from their mistakes,
the spin doctors declare ouija unwise:
playing with fire.

Are there musical instruments
on board?

Apart from the songbirds?
Aye, there’s a flute
to lull the snakes;
and drums, to keep those
larger beasts
in check.

Now two’s a lonely number
for colonial types—
bees, ants and such—
but the termites got busy
in Noah’s wheelhouse where,
despite the cedar’s bitter tang,
their larvae burgeoned.

Over time numbers passed two
thousand or more—while other
species became extinct, already
while still on board, such as the
silent poet red-green beetle
(Scarabæus poeta tacitus ruber-viridis).

Naamah, lady of the ship,
made ear adornments
with the decorative dead.
Japheth son sang lays aloft
the rigging, in his many tongues.
Only the nameless daughter
(eminently forgettable)
had practical use,
raising table greens
(and crops for the crops of the birds).

Of these birds, it was the dove
weeks later
upon returning with an olive leaf
freshly plucked, that declared
“all off board”.

In the scramble
sundry were trampled,
bogged.
Their Earth,
though rid of scum,
somehow scummier—
muddier—
inbreeding rife.

A new phase now started
with death ever near—
despite divine promise,
floodful and full fear.

1. Catherin J Pascal Dunk contributed stanzas 1-3, 7, 8, 10, 12, plus the last two and three lines respectively of stanzas 4 & 5; Drager Meurtant contributed the balance (the first three lines of stanzas 4 and 5, the entirety of stanzas 6, 9 & 11; stanza 13 was written by Drager and edited by Catherin). ↩︎