Not everything,
Not everything can they do,
These civilized ones.
There are still things so strange
They will never understand — Never.
They have left them far behind.
They can no longer talk to Gods,
Their magic spirit has been tamed.
Ah, sad ones.
To be so lost;
They come to us and ask,
“Let us see you walk on fire.”
“Call the fish from out the sea.”
“Make the great turtles rise.”
They watch and then they laugh.
“Conjurers,” they say.
But wait, wait until the storm comes,
Three weeks of rain and fury.
Then watch them;
They too will throw kava to the Devil God,
They too will apologise to Tui Revu Revu.
Oh yes, not everything can they do.
They cannot believe,
They cannot sing to Hina,
They do not know how to ask her for sharks.
Alas, poor men,
They do not even know how to do nothing.
They come to us searching;
We show them and then they do not want to go home.
Alas, poor men — so civilized, so tamed, so trapped.
Goddess, teach me to praise
loss, death and the passing of
all things — for from this flux
I know your blessings flow.
— Erica Jong, WITCHES