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And in the trees of Bengal, the shokun sat perched – as they had from the beginning of time – and waited for sustenance and sanction, hunched forward on bare branches, holding their wings aloft in the dry heat, always in preparation for another sacred cleansing feast of flesh.

The cries of the shokun call out, bathed under endless sun:

What fool invents history?

Death is yet another beginning. Life is naught but illusion

carried on the wings of carrion birds.

©2020 J.D. Brayton

Release in March- e-book and print