Alien Script (Inspired By The Book Of Daniel,5 & 6) Poem by Daniel Brick

Suddenly, the evening stars blaze across the heavens.
Brilliant light and brilliant music
cascade across the marble courtyard.
Clouds slice the moon. Shadows and lights
contend to beautify the one thousand revelers.

The young King, attired in purple robes,
dances gracefully in the fumes of wine.
His ecstatic lovers sing of flowering gardens;
his whirling friends entrance him with flatteries.
Servants pour wine into vessels stolen from the Temple.

The young King cries in a voice of jewels
mined from the Mountains of the Gods and Goddesses,
'This wine flies like a bronze butterfly!
This dance scatters stars over the golden carpet! '
His Queen hands him fresh wine in a vessel from the Temple.

* * * *

A shudder passes like a malevolent wind
through the revelers, reeling on emerald cushions,
slipping from jeweled thrones. The hot wine
freezes in their parched throats. The vessels
from the Temple in Jerusalem fall from their hands.

The young King's glazed eyes see the hand
write a message in an alien script. He is terrified
by what he cannot read. In a clay voice, he croaks,
'Whose mute god scrawled this emblem? ' He trembles,
he stumbles, the purple robes hang loose around his body.

His Queen advises him to summon the dream-reader,
to bring Daniel to his desperate banquet, Daniel
reads the alien script in night's alphabet, Daniel
drinks no wine poured into vessels from the Temple. Daniel translates the alien script that makes

another man King. The young King's brain is fogged
by wine drunk from a chalice stolen from the Temple.
He dresses Daniel in purple robes and gold chains,
and declares he is one of the three rulers of the kingdom.
That night the young King is murdered. King Darius prevails.

* * * *

Daniel's eyes burn with the glory of serving
the one God, the true God. His hands have touched
the empty splendor of purple garments, his ears
have heard the hollow ring of coin and crown.
His speech displays his delight in the glory of God.

'I feel the presence of my God - in the lion's
roar, in the fire's breath, in our circle dance
of joy. I see my God. I watch his beautiful Face.
HE IS OUR LIVING GOD, HE ENDURES FOR EVER,
HIS EMPIRE NEVER COMES TO AN END. HE SAVES,

HE SETS FREE, AND WORKS SIGNS AND WONDERS
IN THE HEAVENS AND ON EARTH. ALL TREMBLE BEFORE HIM.'
Three times each day, Daniel went down on his knees,
praying and pleading with God, to bring peace into
the Kingdom of King Darius of the Medes and the Chaldeans.