Quietly the primal dream <br />asserts its laws; all round the town <br />eyes of shell, tin, coral, gleam; <br />masks, figures, grimace gape and frown; <br />sly, lecherous, bland, amused or stern, <br />the children of the earth return. <br /> <br />Two thousand years of guilt have spread <br />their wordy labyrinthine creed: <br />the son-god rising from the dead, <br />the father god that watched him bleed, <br />the ghost whose tongues inspire and burn. <br />Now children of the earth return. <br /> <br />Each gallery mounts them on display <br />and little printed cards spell out <br />Ashanti, Papua, Malay, <br />Yoruba, Thai; though we may scout <br />beliefs our histories did not earn, <br />the children of the earth return. <br /> <br />Let us pretend it's mainly trade <br />that brings them here, no mystery. <br />Their tribal elders were well paid <br />for deities and history <br />and need no untoward concern <br />as children of the earth return. <br /> <br />They're unsophisticated, crude, <br />the women steatopygous, <br />the men hard-eyed, long-membered, lewd, <br />the gods bizarre, indecorous. <br />What makes me feel I must discern <br />why children of the earth return, <br /> <br />and with such confident ap[lomb? <br />I touch with cautious reverence <br />and feel dark inner pulses drum <br />and pierce a long forgotten sense <br />with wisdoms I have yet to learn. <br />The children of the earth return.<br /><br />Robin Skelton<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/resurgence/
