in certain moons, conjunction of the stars and planets
like the conjunction of the moon and mars tonight, 1/30/10
this is one of those times when on the ancient coral atolls
and the hummocked mountains garlanded with foam and palms,
bristling with impenetrable cane thickets,
the kind of places Herman Melville and his friend traipsed
when they jumped ship in the Marquesas--

in places like this where the black robes came
where the solemn puritans came
and the poor black natives died
under the lash of jesus, under the lash of viruses,
under the lash of the puritans' stentorian disapproval
these poor woolly natives with their grass garments and wild seaside copulations
all they have now is the old cracked wrack of their blasted bodies
as they shamble to life under the tropical moon

there on the margin of the ring of fire
an old dynamo sleeps
Lake Toba, a gigantic volcano, dormant now
erupted 750,000 years ago
"The last eruption had an estimated Volcanic Explosivity Index of 8 (described as
"mega-colossal"), making it possibly the largest explosive volcanic eruption within
the last twenty-five million years."

this, the zombies know, even without Wikipedia
they know this volcano rumbles, even now
they know this volcano is locked and loaded
its guns pointed at space, ready to kill us all
the compassionate zombies know
that all the black robes and their ilk would die
but they are forgiving, zombies (this is not widely known)
especially cannibal zombies, those averse to eating brains,
(mainly because they fear Kuru, and have developed taboos against it
so they never would've even eaten a missionary, well,
not his brain at any rate)
(besides, missionaries were notoriously stringy)

nevertheless, these zombies know
they know an eruption is coming

and they know that the volcanos need virgins

volcanos hunger for virgins, as everyone knows
why this should be, no one can say
but for thousands of years, natives have been sending their most beautiful girls,
garlanded with foam and palms, garlanded with lovely flowers and gems, into the maws
of these muttering volcanos, praying this precious sacrifice would appease them.

The zombies, precious few, virgins
(when you die, you are revirginated
this is a technicality) and, though they are no longer lovely,
they garland themselves with rotten flowers,
with stinking vegetations and vines like putrid snakes
and under a moon like a rheumy eye,
yellow as the yolk of an egg, with a mote of angry mars
spinning out like a tear,
as on a night like this very night, the zombies,
having learned a thing or two about compassion,
having learned what it is like to be made extinct,
will do their pathetic best to save us from this fate!

They will march up the wrinkled spine of the hill
and one by one hurl themselves into the red fire deep,
deep in the caldera, small far below as the planet mars in the sky,
deep at the earth's core,
hoping to stave off a supercolossal explosion,
to save all of us, even those
who wiped them off the face of the earth.