Mayan Appreciation Poem by Terence George Craddock (Spectral Images and Images Of Light)

The Maya appreciate people
even when departed are dead.

Maya invite dead spirit
to continue in the world;
to remain in the world
to help with their toil.

To do this the Maya pass
coca leaves three times;
around honoured laid out
corpse of the dead person.

While in esteemed western society
we do not even appreciate;
the living when they are alive
when unknown strangers unknown to us.

Why is it people living at altitude
in primal harmonious agricultural lifestyles;
have a reverent respect for nature essential
have a more enlightened attitude to life?

I thought pursuit altitude sickness
was supposed to harass affect;
people living at such high altitude
yet Maya living in clouds of Gods;

become tired ill with decent into valley
of pristine fertile green pastures;
where interactive infection breeds
swifter than can grow green spring grass.

Even among Maya some villagers
get drunk so become violent;
and cannot behave as civilized
people by necessity must behave.

Even when Mayan villagers
must sacrifice a lama for meat;
music is appreciation played
all care all life reverence;

must be appropriately given
to all community animals sacrificed.

Even the tinku the fighting ritual
an encounter of differing energies;
tinku is ritual encounter not brawl
to restore unity among participants.

Tinku meaning equals fighting not to win
but to define territory between villages;
the recognition is that community unity
is needed for essential survival of villages.

Feathered hats of warriors are shaped
like hats of conquistadors who took territory;
this fighting ritual is for luck to keep away evil
evil legacy is greed rage conquistador values.