Today’s poem is by Altivo Overo, which first appeared in Civilized Beasts, volume II, called “Thoughts Chelonian”, read for you by Madison Scott-Clary, whose tail is behind her.

You’re listening to The Voice of Dog.

And today’s poem is by Altivo Overo,

which first appeared in Civilized Beasts,

volume II, called

“Thoughts Chelonian”,

read for you by Madison Scott-Clary,

whose tail is behind her.

Please enjoy “Thoughts Chelonian”,

a poem by Altivo Overo Thoughts Chelonian

Ten hundred hundred times the wandering sun Has darkened,

vanished without trace,

returned; And though my time grows short at least I know My life is writ in arcane symbols turned Into th'enspiraled

patterns of my shell.

O strangely graven Carapace,

speak thou well.

That hasty, wastrel, upstart race called Man,

With life so short as just a single gasp,

Despoils the honest earth,

the sea, the sky. Poisons all the world as might an asp On whom have carelessly trodden all,

So thus from whom the bitter end will fall.

We, the shell-locked tortoises,

survived Much longer,

watching, keeping without fail Upon our shells the twisting lines that speak A long unfolding,

slow, and bitter tale.

It tells an ageless story

and the fate Of all who would themselves be named

as great. The universe moves on,

that writing says

And pauses not to hear a muttered spell,

Nor listens ever to a desperate cry,

Nor heeds the solemn death bell's knell.

Yet in the starlight,

graven 'pon a shell,

The ancient history

is told full well.

A life lived ever slowly,

one lived fast, Are both

ere long just doomed

to be the past. This was

“Thoughts Chelonian”

by Altivo Overo,