The Crystal Altar

Somewhere in a secret nook,
Where water has worn the stone away,
Cradled by the tender streams
Lit by starlight and stray beams
Of the moon that above gleams,
Somewhere where no one will look,
Lies an altar of crystal decay.

The stone gleams like a prison,
Shining with trapped light of stars.
Beside it rests a golden cup
From which, at one time, would sup
Those women who looked up
And saw with fourfold vision
The heavenly lights agleam afar.

What sacrifices here were made,
On this stone so slick and smooth?
Around the altar, in grass and mud,
There grow flowers in a flood.
Were they watered once with blood?
Were struggling prisoners, in this glade,
Bound so that they could not move,

And their blood savagely taken?
But the altar has not that air.
Perhaps of worship it still reeks,
But the clarity of its creeks,
The sun-glory each flower seeks,
Make it seem not yet forsaken,
Or abandoned, bereft of care.

Perhaps, then, lost hands still tend
The altar, and bind it with blooms.
Perhaps only water sweet and clear
Was ever drunk or spilled here,
And the moonlight's running tears
That brilliance to the altar lend
Give not false beauty to these glooms.