ON THE SIXTH DAY HE WENT FOR LUNCH

I first noticed the faint ripples
on the skin of earth one creation evening.
Half-bored, I though to try something new;
and perhaps to break up our cosmic monotony
I slipped a slightly moistened finger into that
fertile surface with its new covering of verdant fur,
probing into its warm and oozing interior.
A small misty flood escaping up around
my anxious hand gave birth to new ideas.
Thinking that there might be something perfect
beneath that crust of earthly unspoiledness,
I sought to bring it forth in my own image,
but fearing the chancey result of an untried joke
I took a heavy sip of the sparkling ink of heaven,
better to facilitate an efficient extraction.
Humming a salty psalm excitedly under my breath
I pushed one then two then three then four
fingers and then finally a determined thumb
down into the miasmic mantle that skirted the fiery heart
of this magical fruit which had bloomed on the vines
of the primordial firmament of evening and morning.
Groping about I felt the nudge of something tiny
which tried at first to draw away from my tingling skin
but then stopped. Perhaps knowing that I was on to something,
it waited there, a half-sensing seed, then almost
brought itself into my carefully closing hand.
With it safely held in my guiding palm I
withdrew from the dust of the earth: my prize.
And there in my open hand it lay, unmoving,
warm and pink and equipped with marvelous limbs.
I held it up to my shaking lips and blew softly,
breathing life into its tiny but perfect nostrils.
It stirred, slowly at first, and then stood up,
staring into my eyes as if searching for knowledge,
whereon I quickly realized what it was about.
Raising it up to my lips again I sniffed
its warm and fleshy aura, drinking in
its innocent and newly-formed uniqueness.
Reaching out my tongue to better taste its mortal riches,
I drew it back into my anxiously waiting mouth
which, tasting its promise, closed upon it lusciously,
revelling in the juicy wonderfullness of its savoury flesh
and delicate bones; and as a trickle of its scarlet juice
ran down along my proud creator's chin,
I thrust my hand again down into the waiting earth
to see if perhaps in my newly-made universe of
nifty playthings I could catch
another.



                                             (Mike O'Brien)