step one:
remove your shoes—
you stand on hallow’d ground
step two:
barricade the fortress;
let their sanctuary be as a prison.
let none enter.
let none leave.
step three:
silence.
step four:
silence as you have been commanded.
travel as you have been commanded.
seven circles of the golden city.
step five:
silence.
then s h o u t.
(loud enough to shake the ground beneath your feet,
loud enough to loose brick from mortar, stone from stone
loud enough to shake the foundations of their temples
loud enough to strike cracks into desert ground
loud enough to strike fear into their hearts)
then silence.
step six:
watch stone rain from the sky,
watch a legend collapse.
(light the lamp,
loose the flame)
watch the ruins burn.
step seven:
salvage what you can
(the bronze of your trumpets,
the gold of their shrines)
s h o u t —
for the city has been given unto you.
(this is why it is called deliverance)
jericho (or the truth is in the furnace, scatter the ashes) e.v.[x]