The NaPoWriMo prompt for today is ‘to write a poem about a mythical person or creature doing something unusual – or at least something that seems unusual in relation to that person/creature.’
I don’t think what I have written can be called a poem, not even a prose poem, but it’s a response to the prompt. An allegory if you like.
The Great Panjandrum moves
Darkness lay on the face of the Earth as it did before the Organisation, but now it crawled with men and their veils of fiery smoke. Above, in the sunlit uplands on their imaginary mountains and puffy clouds, basking in ambrosia and celestial harp music, with choirs of winged eunuchs and naked minors, the imaginary deities led their parallel existences. Some looked down with furrowed brow, some pointed and laughed or carpet-bombed with thunderbolts because it was Tuesday. And one looked away because, although He was omnipotent, He was powerless, or unmotivated, to stop it. It was one of the rules, and he had written the rules. Why, is the great mystery of Faith.
Darkness, thicker than ever, spewed and vomited over the Earth, and as they felt the end approaching, a great prayer went up from the suffering people to the imaginary host in the sky. In the past, the sacrifice of a child (spare daughter) would have won over most imaginary deities, but in the End Days, there was only the One. The Great Panjandrum. And ye cannot petition the Lord with prayer! Never, in the existence of humanity had the GP interceded to change the course of human suffering. It was an ethical thing. Upholding the free will of butchers.
But we are innocent! went up the cry from the depths.
The Great Panjandrum shrugged. No one is innocent. Except Mother.
And the weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth made such a clamour, that the imaginary mountains and puffy clouds rocked and put the chorus of winged eunuchs off its stroke, and the hundreds and hundreds of imaginary beings yelled at the Great Panjandrum to show misericorde. Hundreds and hundreds of former representatives of the GP begged Him. Even his mother begged Him to do something.
Finally, the Great Panjandrum sighed and peered over a puffy cloud, through the veils of smoke and fire at the heaving mass of dying humanity. He saw the outstretched hands of tiny children, the unspeakable horrors, and He pointed.
You.
In a village, laid waste by a retreating army, among the heaps of dead and dying, a last execution was about to be held. The Great Panjandrum pointed, and the tank commander looked at his watch.
No time, he shouted, and his men piled into their tanks and left. In the village, surrounded by heaps of dead and dying, the baker, a corpulent middle-aged man in the terminal stages of cardiovascular disease who had never been known to give a centime’s credit, fell down on his knees in gratitude.
A miracle!
Satisfied? The Great Panjandrum asked.
His former representatives on Earth beamed, and His mother tapped him on the arm.
You see? Sometimes it’s good to act out of character. You’ve made one fat baker very happy.