The painter’s brush was commissioned

by those who drank from noble vessels

to account a sacrifice at court:

Seated ruler with a spiteful glare

while an executor displays a trophy head,

three captive tremble to see their fate.

The artist’s brush was not mistaken

on his painted vase held in our gaze:

Common humanity is unbound

by the artist’s intent to illustrate

bodies bowed in submission,

drops of red accentuated,

stricken eyes stare out forever.

 

Eminence is a painted vessel

Pouring crimson ch’ulel

For the Gods embodiment.

Sheer obsidian blade, fierce will

Let his blood spill on precious white paper.

Human and tree, their vital quintessence

Set aflame, form ethereal clouds

Suffuse Otherworld senses.

Pungent , intoxicated become the Spirits

Breathing in their animate conjuration.

 

 

 

At the place of ball game sacrifice

The skull plays the foil

Head planted above center court

Presents a face-up point of view

To metaphysical questions

Tells of och ta chan

“He entered the sky”

On cloud shadows passing over.

 

 

 

Here is the ruler’s crumbled stela,

set upright, reassembled;

brought back to living sight

from an arid abyss.

See carved image of a stalwart queen,

serpent bar across her chest,

standing top bent human forms,

a platform on caiman waters.

Here is eternity consumed by elements,

long count orders broken down;

sliver moon, ruler Ix,

vanishing to forest shadow.

In the ball court a skull presides,

panel patrons offer tribute prize;

deer in hand, player b’alam

keeps the final score.

Here are crossroads to four directions,

center stones for myth creation,

where celestial bodies made passage

beneath their sak b’ih footprints.

Ball, sky high

Falls heavy, swift

Sun blinded fury

Blazing white

Bones, down, hard

On the players field

Rolling on top of its shadow

To speechless

Head above ground

Looks up forever

While stars spin thread

Around axis mundi

Clouds dissolve in empyreal blue

Indelible skull

Floating on the surface

Extends itself at midday.

Spiral skeleton will be a palette

carved to hold light wave composition

by one who paints with fine brush & animated gesture

drawing forth from an underwater cave

to the top of his astral-bodied headdress

a vertebrate multihued organism

undersigned by his writing.

Painted red human figures in fluid procession

on serpentine road marked by black footprints –

the way to Flower Mountain.

Lord wearing charcoal face and feline tail

presents blossom vine to scarlet prince

dressed with first green sign and trumpet shell,

followed by sky bearers.

First tree sprouted an arboreal garden,

animal eyes, their foliate cave opening

joined with limestone pendent to light

yellow female offering seeds.

Inside Flower Mountain

avian man oversees the birth place:

infants suspended by their umbilical cords at four corners;

a fountain at cardinal center gushing crimson,

emergent God seed burst open.

Long passage inscribed in numerical succession;

existence, a walkway, set with stone markers, void spaces.

From nothing came first day, Imix, water blossom,

and the days that came after naming life elements,

and an image of this day period ending.

So all the days counted weigh heavy with stature,

will not fall off the edge, not empty out to boundless sky,

lost beyond the stars.

Here is logical sequence, higher order intoned:

As the sun rises to Lord Ahaj  then descends beneath his temple,

luminous night must follow.

In a room made of variant faces

telling time & occasion

young heir, Kan B’ahlam, 

stands on a precious shell pedestal

as god hand unwinds serpent vine

bloomed with maize head

marked female Ix.

He holds blood – letting instrument

to center, Na Te’ K’an, first ripe plant, 

sprouted from a lily head rooted below surface,

takes human symmetry.

Wearing k’an yellow crown,

scarlet feathers, syllable sign la;

leafy arms extend twin heads – facing skyward.

Sun-eyed Kan B’ahlam grown tall

out of a skull mountain cleft

offers mirror image Lord, Ahau,

to Itzam -Ye, first feathered crest

on a totem tree risen from white flower water.

When you truly desire to fly you will know how to

Dressed in cotinga & quetzal feathers, fastened carefully

You begin by painting sky & water

Aquamarine, cobalt, cyan, cerulean

Cut a horizon sharp as an obsidian blade

Color the sun amber with an azure smoldering rim.

Then, when the brush is poised from longing

Sketch the green golden curve of your iridescent wings

Rising an airborne stairway on the back of Ehecatl

Wind as master, you are its exuberant child, lost in azul

While the world sails on over the lazuline edge of your painting.