i

…and when it came time
for gods to then eat
Prometheus hid
the delectable meat,

and gave to the gods
inedible bones!
Man got the best pick,
but all knowing Zeus,
he knew of the trick.

To placate his ire
he took from the man
all of his fire –
No culture,for man;
no hearth for his home;

this then the trick
did Zeus so atone.

…and Zeus then looked ‘round
for alternative viand:

“Let gods have ambrosia,
leave meat to the man!”

ii
…and Prometheus stole
the fire for man,
but this only man Zeus
angry again.

His punishment,
Prometheus
forever is bound
to a stone tower

where eagle devoured
the liver of giver
of fire to man;

only to let it
grow back full again.

…and forever on ever
it grows back, amends,
and eagle will eat it
again and again.

Thus is the punishment
for siding with man;

Thus is the Telos
for pain unto end:

Forever to suffer
for man to befriend,
again, and again,
and again.

iii

….and man would defend
Promethean deeds,
when gods all atop,
man no longer needs.

When Hercules found,
unbound and then freed
the god from the rock
it become the new seed

to shock the god Zeus
from atop and succeed
polytheism with monotheism:
a one God creed.

Such be the fortune
of gods who should fight
mankind, but destruction –
for man learned to write!

iv
…and Word became power
to win at last hour,
when Fiction, Imagination,
and Word set things Right.

The Pen, more mighty
than all of the gods….
in a Word, man replaced
the gods’ only job.

©2014, Marvin Welborn.
8 July 2014.