Worship

BY Antigone Kefala

They ate the soil, slept with it,
the scent coursing their blood
till they were filled with earth,
took the sheep for lovers
prayed in mutilated voices,
in harsh goat tongues they sang
of rocky sites, hard winters
echoes of wind at night
in the rough trees.

The arms of the white statue
on the peak
stretching like giant horns
in the spring sun.