Ornithology

Human-headed winged bull from Khorsabad. University of Chicago Oriental Institute.

Sacred ibises fleeing overhead,

Tiglath-Pileser—Oh, no!—not dead,

King of the Four Corners of the World,

King of the whilom Universe.

He, it's said, made Assyria great.

Al Jazeera bemoans that curse;

Petrodollars corrupt the state—

The global market's flogged its fate!

What’s left to say? "Things could be worse!"?

We’re all Threskiornithidae* today,

Negotiating swamps of jargon,

Confused by memories of Sargon,**

Caesar, Napoleon, and Errol Flynn—

Ancestral bullies bound to win!

* “The family Threskiornithidae . . . 35 extant species of large wading birds, and one more that became extinct in historical times” (Wikipedia). The name derives from the Greek word thrēskeia, "religion.” The African sacred ibis, Threskiornis aethiopicus, has, however, been extirpated in Egypt, where it was originally deemed sacred.

** Sargon the Great (died ca. 2279 BCE), the world's first recorded emperor.

Knysna, Western Cape, South Africa, Monday, April 13, 2026