A kettle of eight vultures rising, circling in the morning sun
They bank and swoop over the roof of the anthropology department
Where the vault of plundered skeletons lies
The vultures wheel and turn for minutes on end, as if to say
Give us the old bones
Give them to us, that we might crack them open
Give them to us that we might feast on ancient marrow
Give them to us so that, through our repast, they might return to the land of their ancestors
Give them to us so they might grow life anew
The building, impassive, does not respond
But the birds will rise again the next morn
Their unspoken demand still on the wind, gliding silently on a rising thermal

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