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A Flower Song
In xōchitl in cuīcatl [the flower the song]: the Aztec definition of Poetry.
Apparently the Aztecs, Toltecs, Chichimecs and other Mexica were crazy about poetry. Despite the book-burning, slaughter, and epidemics that characterized the early stages of the Spanish conquest of the empires of Mexico, some hundreds of poems from the height of their tradition come down to us in Classical Nahuatl, preserved by Nahua and Spanish scholars of the 16th century. One of the most famous poets, Nezahualcoyotl, was a sage-king who opposed the cult of human sacrifice associated with Tezcatlipoca, God of the Smoking Mirror, and favored Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent. Flowers and feathers were the favorite offering of the Plumed Serpent. Moreover, flowers and feathers are a metaphor for poetry. Individual words, scattered petals, the down of tropical birds. The temples of blood sacrifice could be transformed into temples of flower and song. A sublimated offering to the Heart of Earth and the Heart of Sky encapsulated in the Classical Nahuatl kenning for poetry: in xōchitl in cuīcatl, meaning, "the flower and the song."
The following poem is part of a longer work, and is in a state of flux, so take the waters as they flow:
PostClassical StoneAge
FLOWERSONG in
jeweled blues;
greens of grass cloak
the roseate violet which outlines
the curved tailspray
of the quetzal in flight.
Streamers! let
there be bloom,
burdening
the boughs–
birds
bees.
So [in xōchitl in cuīcatl]
FLOWERMAGE, come beat my drum!
totoco totoco tico totoco totoco
Heart of Earth/
[and]
\Heart of Sky
form in pair the Eye of the Storm;
sheathed in song like
maize is sheathed in husks, the
troops of the tribes spy a hoop
[not only the Mexica].
Oh well–
dead or alive,
it is the same
Dance. Coming to You
Live from the House of the Sun. [in xōchitl in cuīcatl]
Rhythmed: tico titico titico tico
Something framed there, blocky
arrangements of space color coded
bordered and bannered
in a Classical Calendar,
if only as an excuse
for jade and gold to shine. Mirror mirror
Is there any meaning in any of it? the product of agave juices and laughter of lunar rabbits magnify the branch of a flowering tree in springtime. Seen reversed in the polished stone eye.
Trippy stone-age looking glass mystifies:
an artifact found thousands of times.
Obsidian ignition seeds the flame:
Still the ant will not wish to be incinerated
Under the magnifying-glass.
A way of starting fires,
And a tool for divination.
This is a perfectly polished stone,
Imperfectly circular on purpose,
Concentrating
Sunlight
Into
Flame.
[through the looking-glass]
To see the image of the Plumed Serpent–
Centralized in a vast maze of stairways–
With the convex of the Smoking Mirror.
The world is painted in flowers, not blood:
A bud opens its heart in song–
poem.
Under open cluster of constellation,
Harmonic, flowers, nursed on gore offered
To the fields of the sun, narco-floral
Flutter-by on intoxicating wavelengths.
We are clothed/
\we are bathed
/We are drowned
In the flow of stanzas\
butterflies in
paradise or mere
decorticated animals
reduced to pulp?
–decked in flowers
–a series of glyphs trickles–
superimposed over
the moonwhite
convex of a defleshed skull,
[or is it fruit?]
Here, in this place where everything is shorn of flesh, stripped of meat. Here, in the ribcage of the singer, a beating heart, which thrills
to the curve of fabulous
boas of quetzal plumage
fluffing the heavens. Its flight
And coloration is miniaturized in
A hummingbird’s pursuit of nectar.
Tiny bill inserted into the bell of flowers, dual natured, slithering, belly to the ground, the veining of the low and earthly tracing, dressed in feathers, as if angelic, its tongue is
A series of scrolls, now
tapering, resulting in the
point of a bone needle, or
needle of agave:
fit to pierce the tongue
or tip of the penis
for a bloodletting
blotted on paper–
flintknife in single
blade tapers to two
chipped-out
knifepoints
dual-
natured
split
objectified as a burnt-offering.
Decked in blossoms–ohuaye!
What realms do we excavate
In the harvesting of this pollen?
They are all petals,
Smoke rising to the nostrils
Of psychotic deities.
Feathered slither
Leathered wither
LEAF foil, royal
Exfoliation:
Ohuaye! Dressed in flowers
which set the Jaguar
and the Eagle
to dancing– they vomit a vision
sucrose pollination
honeyed by eons
of labor,
elaborated
by countless hands
and countless
vocal chords:
a sacred calendar
of glyphs, honeycombed.
We see cruel forms reversed
Into a progress of the year, marked
By superstitious seers, mathematically
Supported
Unstoppable onward. Lord of
Wind stirs aroma of cacao and
Chiles, reddened with legendary blood-
Letting [thorn in my tongue]
Chocolate, emulsified,
bitter cacao with blood, hot,
achiote reddens to the tone
of the clay pot. Cold Froth.
Lord of Wind swirls
Even into recesses and places
Deep below
Where kids with their last tears
Greet the axolotl in his cenote,
Watery grotto of eternal childhood. But what about our endless offerings of shrimp tamales? we thought You liked them best.
(there the rainbow serpent slithers)
thru tobacco bloom
and cornflowers
SMOKING MIRROR
like a silhouette, in the Eye
of the Storm, Heart of the Sky,
Heart of the Earth–
Songs tell of the World-Tree,
boughs all burdened
With birds.
The mouth of the root is reptilian; like a needlepoint
It orders the realms,
With brachial structures
Rooted deep down.
Jadeform faces
Uncover deathmask chronology, over-
Crowded with lost ancestors
Reborn as butterflies
Or hummingbirds
There in the House of
The Sun. Where some-
Thing like waterfalls
splash in rainbow
plumage
Like a
jeweled vapor.
The Jaguar
and the
Eagle
Are set
on
dancing.
The Killer/
Killed//:
Roaring with Thunder
He has spread his wealth of eaglefeathers far and wide while the invisible heart of the jade-bright hummingbird beats faster than can be imagined.
What hums? the wing
Or the heartbeat?
A star-cluster blooms,
Ciphered in animal faces,
Blooms into a flowertree,
Cactus-branch where an eagle
Has perched, ready to consume
The rattlesnake:
Great Tree
Prolific in flowers
Prolific in thorns–
Please shade the Flowermage,
who strikes the kettle with a
titoco titoco titocoti
And who explains the hieroglyphic books
Filled with calabash skullfruit,
Drinking-gourd, praised
By the lunatic rabbits who assemble,
Telling tales of virgin births
(The Sun, an excuse to shine)
Because XOCHITL
It is a flower.
A fleeting moment, only fallen petals. Or
Maybe a hummingbird feeder
Of popcorn buds and cacao blossoms;
in fragrance fallen,
drifted on trail of gentle breezes
LIFE GIVER–which bird complains about his call, his feathers?
rainbowseraphic,
Movement is the prism of airflow, a
Waterfall, plume, petal, scale or skin
on sacred wings…
FLAYED: divided into days and dusted with jadefeather pollen spiked by sunflow like watery crystal that progresses untainted in the mire and sacrificial blood that sustains its orbit. That is why
we welcome dead heroes from the House of
the Sun, jadeswift hummingbird
redfeathered
wending his winged hum
away among waters
and flowers as waterfall wind, solar-electic;
all just to have a honey suckle at the
flower’s Heart
Newly opened/
Beating like dawn. Ayyo!
Set out honey for the hummers
[dead heroes from the house
of the sun]
Heart of the Flower/
Eye of Flint//:
World in a black stone mirror; was bleeding
Forth a libation of song
Into the sun’s bonfire.
Hope you have enjoyed. I haven't been able to participate for a while, due to work, home, and other laborious projects we creators put upon ourselves for our own good or detriment. But I have missed it. I hope to be able to get on a couple times a week for fun and games. May your life be filled with chocolate and chiles! May you see the image in the Smoking Mirror, and the hummingbird that graces the feeder or the blossom. The flower, the song.
-Rob Angeli
More:
And:
About the Creator
Rob Angeli
sunt lacrimae rerum et mentem mortalia tangunt
There are tears of things, and mortal objects touch the mind.
-Virgil Aeneid I.462
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Comments (17)
Congrats on Top Story! :)
niceeeee!!!!!
Very good
I love this! Congratulations on your top story ?
Back to say congratulations on your Top Story! 🎉💖🎊🎉💖🎊
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Creative story with beautiful images, connecting life and nature. congratulations on the top story.
Damn o damn, what a way to make your return! Well done on an epic Top Story and epic piece in its own right! Hope you're well, Rob!
wonderful compilation of verbal images... missed you...and your poetic song.. tida tida tidika ta... the pictures are great... work/life balance is tricky
Thanks for sharing.
Ahh the king has returned! How have you been, Rob? Hope everything in your part of the world has been going your way :) This poem was so good I think it evades my skills in verse to fully comprehend it! I'll have to come back a few times I think to just bask in the skill on display!
Rob is back! I'm glad! Hope you are doing well:) I've not much knowledge about Aztec culture, but I see how you've interwoven so many things here; not all of them I could follow, but this poem feels grand. And it makes me sad I don't have much time to explore this ancient world and its meanings.
Well-wrought! Good to see your work pop up again! Hope you've been well!
Mmmm, blood and chocolate, my two favourite things! Loved your poem so much! I was so excited to see your name in my notifications. You were missing for so long. How have you been doing Rob?
This covers so many things of that culture, it is truly unique and fabulous, with a lyrical bent to it.
Simply magnificent. I really enjoyed this.
An astounding achievement! One of my favorite lines -- "sheathed in song like / maize is sheathed in husks" .... the words of your poem like a sheath for the cultural artifacts you tribute. In places this has a sing-song, almost jazz feel -- if Kerouac were Aztecan. Loved this.