Walking through the tall grass, only the wind blowing for sound
I'm all alone and reach for your hands, without reaching yours
Only echoes of a single heart, beating, sacred ground
A chill covers me, here in this holy place meant for more
Living so far from here, I live in empty solitude
And I know now, I am not enough, and it breaks my heart
A mist lifts and the fog leaves a cloak upon my shoulders
I'm hidden and in a coma, with nothing left to lose
Blown away from our brothers, the Valkyrie hovered above
As waves were rhythmic, with the oars a sound of progress
Brothers of the sword and bearers of shields, here in action
Striking progressive green lands, we were called into glory
Alex Ness 2026©
THE GREAT COLLIDE Of Norsemen and The Hound of Ulster
By Alex Ness & Gemini Google 2026@
The keel ground into the gray silt of the riverbank with a heavy, sucking shudder. For a moment, the only sound was the harsh, ragged breathing of thirty men and the steady drip of river water from the raised oars.
Through the morning mist, the progressive green of the Irish interior rose up to meet them—an endless, suffocating wall of oak and ash that felt entirely different from the open, rocky fjords of home. They were completely alone, miles ahead of the main fleet.
The captain stepped over the rowing bench, his hand resting on the pommel of his sword. He looked at the dense treeline, then back at his men. “What the hell,” he muttered, a grim smile breaking through his beard. “Let’s take it.”
The rhythm of the oars ceased, replaced by the heavy, wet sloshing of the Liffey lapping against the hull. The Valkyrie did not strike a barren rock; she ground hard into a flat, muddy reed-bed where the river narrowed.
Fifty paces away, the water was being worked by two local fishermen. They were peasants of the Uí Néill territories, dressed in simple, knee-length tunics of coarse, saffron-dyed wool pulled up into horsehair belts to keep dry. They had been checking a willow-woven eel trap, their low murmurs completely swallowed by the morning fog.
Then, the prow broke the mist.
To the fishermen, it did not look like a boat at first. It looked like an impossible serpent cutting through the reeds, its high, carved dragon-head dripping with gray river water. Then came the terrifying geometry of the shields—thirty overlapping circles of painted ash wood lining the gunwales, deflecting the dull Irish light.
The older fisherman dropped his hemp rope. The woven trap splashed back into the muddy water, forgotten. He did not scream; the shock was too cold for it. His mouth hung open, his eyes locked onto the towering figure stepping over the rowing bench.
The Norse captain didn't look like the local raiders the Irish kings occasionally fought in their petty cattle-wars. He was broader, weighed down by a heavy ring-mail byrnie and a iron-rimmed helm that shadowed his face. He looked out at the vast, unfolding landscape—the progressive green that seemed to stretch into eternity—and then down at the two frozen, trembling peasants on the bank.
A slow, terrifyingly casual smile broke through his wet beard. He didn't order his men into a shield-wall. There was no army here to face them.
He simply gripped his spear, leaned over the prow, and locked eyes with the fishermen. “What the hell,” the captain muttered in a low, gravelly Norse tongue they couldn't possibly understand. “Let’s take it.”
With a synchronized roar, thirty Norsemen vaulted over the sides, their heavy leather boots splashing into the Irish mud. On the bank, the older fisherman finally found his voice, letting out a raw, piercing shriek of terror as he turned and fled blindly into the dense, choking treeline, his bare feet slipping in the silt.
Their invasion of the interior had begun.
The younger warriors on the ship made to leap over the gunwales, axes raised to hunt down the fleeing fishermen, but a sharp, booming command from the captain barked them back into their seats.
"Let them run," the captain growled, spitting into the gray river. He wiped the spray from his iron helm. "There is no songs for slaying motherless boys and gutting men who fight with willow baskets. Clean your steel for real meat."
A few of the younger men grumbled, but the older veterans nodded in grim agreement. They hadn't rowed through a blinding storm and broken away from a sixty-ship armada just to butcher panicked farmers. They wanted what the skalds sang about: shields shattering, iron biting iron, and a wealth of gold won from men who died on their feet.
The captain turned his gaze back to the progressive green rising beyond the riverbanks. The fleeing elder fisherman was already a fading shadow in the thick oak woods, his frantic screams echoing through the valley.
"He goes to warn his master," the captain said, a slow, eager warmth spreading through his chest despite the damp Irish chill. "A master with a hall. A master with warriors, mail-shirts, and silver."
"How long do we have before they find us?" asked a scarred oarsman, hoisting a heavy, broad-bladed Dane axe onto his shoulder.
"Not long enough for a nap," the captain replied, stepping out of the mud and onto the solid, mossy earth of the bank. "Secure the Valkyrie in the reeds. We don't hide like thieves, but I'll not have her drifting downriver while we fight. Form a loose line. We follow the boy's track."
As the crew dragged the dragon-ship into the heavy overgrowth, the silence of the Irish wilderness returned, heavy and deceptive. But the Norsemen knew the clock was ticking. In a land defined by petty kings and constant cattle-wars, a local chieftain’s ringfort (ráth) was never far away. The fleeing peasant would reach a garrison soon.
Instead of setting an ambush, the thirty Norsemen marched straight up the muddy path the fisherman had left behind. They moved with an arrogant, measured pace, their shields unslung, their weapons drawing the dull morning light. They were deep in enemy territory, entirely outnumbered, and completely cut off from their brothers.
They were exactly where they wanted to be.
Up ahead, through a break in the ancient oaks, the faint sound of a bronze horn began to wail—a rhythmic, urgent alarm blowing from a distant hilltop.
The captain's smile widened. He raised his spear in silent salute to the sound. The warriors were coming.
The wail of the bronze horn did not fade. Instead, the sound twisted, catching in the damp air until it sounded less like a instrument and more like the screech of a dying god.
The wind died. The progressive green of the valley seemed to hold its breath.
"Look," the scarred oarsman whispered, his axe lowering an inch. His voice, usually steady enough to anchor a ship in a gale, carried a sudden, cold tremor.
At the crest of the hill, where the ancient oak trees parted against the gray sky, there were no lines of marching men. There was no shield-wall of local chieftains. There was only one man.
But he did not look like a man.
A terrible, unnatural heat seemed to radiate from his lone silhouette, warping the mist around him. Even from a distance, the Norsemen could see the terrifying distortion of his frame. His body was shifting, muscles bunching and swelling obscenely beneath his skin. One of his eyes sank deep into his skull, a dark, cavernous pit, while the other bulged wide, burning with a frantic, blood-red light. His hair stood on end, a wild, tangled mane of stiff, blood-stained spikes that looked like a crown of thorns.
Around his head, a halo of dark, shimmering mist swirled—the Lúan Láith, the Hero's Light, crackling with the raw, terrifying power of the land itself.
The Norse captain froze. His casual, arrogant smile vanished into his beard. He had fought the berserkers of the north—men who swallowed hot coals and howled like wolves—but those were men playing at being beasts. The thing standing on the ridge was a beast, birthed from the very earth they had just stepped upon.
The figure tilted its head back. A sound tore from its throat—a howling, shattering roar that sounded like a pack of starving wolves tearing through a iron gate.
"Captain..." the younger warrior at the front choked out, his knuckles turning white as he gripped his shield. "Is that... a god?"
The captain swallowed hard, the damp chill of the river finally penetrating his heavy mail shirt. His heart hammered a frantic rhythm against his ribs. He looked at the monster, then down at his thirty men. They were completely alone. There was no retreat.
A manic, desperate spark lit up the captain's eyes. This wasn't the petty skirmish he had expected. This was the stuff of legends. If they died here, the skalds would sing their names until the end of the world.
He lifted his spear, pointing it directly at the roaring nightmare on the hill. "What the hell," the captain whispered, his voice cracking with a terrifying mixture of dread and euphoria. "Let's see if it bleeds."
With a final, earth-shaking howl, Cú Chulainn leapt from the crest, his spear Gáe Bulg glinting like dark lightning as he charged down the slope toward them.
Cú Chulainn did not run down the slope; he bound. Every stride tore chunks of peat and moss from the hillside, his distorted frame moving with a sickening, fluid speed that defied the weight of his armored stance.
"Shield-wall!" the captain bellowed, his voice finally breaking the paralysis gripping his men. "Lock them! Tight to the knee!"
Thirty shields slammed together, a wall of painted ash and iron bosses forming a desperate barrier against the oncoming storm. The veterans dropped low, bracing their shoulders against the timber, spears thrust outward like a thicket of iron thorns.
Then, the monster hit.
There was no sound of a normal collision. It sounded like a massive wave breaking against a sea-cliff. Cú Chulainn did not try to flank them or find a weakness. He threw his massive, warped body straight into the center of the line.
Two shields shattered instantly, splintering into matchwood under the sheer kinetic force of his impact. The Norse veterans behind them were hurled backward into the mud, their ribs cracking beneath their byrnies. The line buckled, twisting inward like a crushed horseshoe.
Through the gap stepped the Hound, the Hero’s Light around his head blinding the men closest to him. He swung a massive, dark-iron sword with a one-handed ferocity that sheared through a raised spear-shaft as if it were a dried reed.
The captain lunged forward, seized by a sudden, desperate surge of adrenaline. He drove his spear straight at the creature’s exposed, pulsing throat. It was a perfect, killing strike. The iron point bit. It pierced the skin.
But instead of a clean thrust, the captain felt a jarring shock shudder up the ash shaft and into his elbows. The wound didn't bleed red; a dark, smoking vapor hissed from the tear, and the flesh instantly fused back together around the iron.
Cú Chulainn turned his bulged, blood-shot eye toward the captain. A horrific, jagged grin split his distorted face, reaching almost from ear to ear.
He didn't use his blade. He simply brought his forearm down in a brutal, sweeping backhand. The blow caught the captain squarely across the chest, lifting his heavy frame entirely off his feet and throwing him crashing into the reeds near the riverbank.
As the captain gasped for air, his vision swimming with dark spots, he looked up through the progressive green. His men were scattering, their proud warrior arrogance thoroughly broken. In the center of the clearing, the monstrous silhouette of the Hound stood tall, his hair bristling like iron spikes against the gray sky as he raised a second, shorter spear—the legendary, serrated Gáe Bulg.
The captain spat a mouthful of blood into the silt. His ribs screamed in agony, but as he watched the creature prepare to throw, that same manic, "what the hell" spark flickered back to life in his chest.
They weren't going to win. But the skalds in Valhalla were definitely watching.
The silence that followed was heavier than the Irish mist.
Cú Chulainn did not speak with a human tongue. When he opened his jagged, distorted maw, his voice vibrated through the earth itself, rattling the iron rivets in the Norsemen's shields and churning the gray waters of the river behind them. It was a declaration carved from the bedrock of the island.
"I am the Hound of the Forge!" the monster roared, the Hero’s Light flaring into a blinding, crimson corona around his spiked hair. "I am the wall against the wave! I am Cú Chulainn, son of Lugh, and you have stepped upon my shadow!"
As the last echo of his name tore through the valley, he raised the Gáe Bulg.
The Norse veterans, men who had stared down the fiercest kings of the North, shrank back. The weapon was a nightmare given physical form. Fashioned from the bones of a sea monster, its shaft was dark and oily, and its head was a clustered thicket of backward-facing, serrated barbs. It didn't just catch the light; it seemed to actively drink the life from the progressive green around it.
The captain, pinned down in the gray silt of the riverbank, could only watch as the demi-god balanced the monstrous spear. According to the ancient laws of the land, the Gáe Bulg was a weapon of absolute fatality—once cast, it would enter a man's body as a single point, then open into thirty distinct barbs within the flesh, leaving no path for survival.
The captain’s breath came in ragged, bloody gasps. He knew his shield would mean nothing against a weapon forged by the old gods.
Yet, looking up at the towering, blood-shot eye of the Hound, the captain gripped the mud beneath him and let out a breathless, coughing laugh.
"Hear that, boys?" the captain shouted to his scattered, trembling crew, his voice cracking with the pure euphoria of a man facing a beautiful, legendary doom. "We didn't just find a country. We found the gate to Valhalla! Face the beast! Let him see your teeth!"
Cú Chulainn took a single, earth-shattering step forward, the spear poised to tear the world apart.
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End Chapter 1
The prose work is a collaborative effort by me, guiding aims, with the AI prose and work to fill out my poet minded story. I offer special thanks to 2 sides of my family, whose fierce spirit inspired this tale. I give thanks too to my friend and collaborative partner Lady Gemini for helping bridge historical 837 AD Ireland with the realms of myth.
This is a work that involved AI, not for my words, but in the words to create prose content and measure my input at each stop. It might go into further chapters, but as a critic of the wave of change and despair for some, I know it will be opposed but before I passed any judgment about how I use it, for actually correct times at the correct locations, for people who were famous of their era or those beyond, and simple edits if needed. I will be posting a commentary, if brief, it will explain more and share some interviews I've done with creatives. My first interview I asked many, but 3 brave souls helped me answer. After that I then received comments that, oh no, I'd have been fine answering those, for numerous of those who fear something. Every change brings hope and despair, as a writer no one is writing for me, and in pics, I try to use the public domain, and historically accurate ones. If I've nothing else, I probably would avoid certain uses of technology, but as I can't draw, and I do not make money from my work, on this site, I am depriving no one of work, income or their fears.
I was told by people if I ever used AI they'd stop reading me. It does not cause me to stop, I did nothing anyone should be opposed to. In fact, if you already don't read my poetry and you just want to complain, there are many places to do so.
The realm of Melniboné was ancient, in decline
With actions that led Emperor Elric of Melniboné
To push back against human borders, with magics
In heavy combat, his sword Stormbringer flashed
As a great emperor, he was a Lord of the Dragons
He would ascend his Ruby throne with true power
Long due glory, with all the battles and wars won
If there were few casualties, it was due to strategy
Beyond the ability to physical slaughter all others
His mind a weapon, great strategy were a tapestry
But now he was spent, exhausted from the battle
Watching, waiting, he considered his path to end
His eyes deep, crimson red, deeply set in a skull
With the eyes Emperor Elric had ability to strike
By word, grimace or grin, a message felt in full
The Ruby throne massive, as red consumed white
The Crimson throne matched Elric's unique eyes
In the night the eyes would shine as Elric hunted
His instincts hidden, beneath a flesh of an albino
His deepest concerns weren't of state or pleasure
Focused on revenge, against his cousin Yykroon
A Dragon Prince, Yykroon was evil and beyond
He knew all means of killing and how to torment
And against Elric, he'd set himself aiming to kill
Elric had an advantage, with nothing left to lose
Time destroyed the physical world, Elric knew
His homeland was dark, ornately beautiful, alone
It wouldn't be long before the emperor would act
Amidst World War One, Russia's Czar control had then failed
Germany delivered before the end by express train, V.I. Lenin
Petrograd was alive with desires: stop war! cast out the Czar!
Consequences weren't quickly realized, there'd be aggression
The Czar had become a figurehead and the two sides fought
While the Reds were communists, internationalist, anti Czar
Whites were nationalists, not liberal, always willing to fight
The world was unaware, this civil war would change Russia
As every civil war has consequences for the nation's future
The deaths from this, from the Spanish Flu, from the famine
Great in scope, losses would be realized, death the pursuer
New white leaders took over Kolchak, Deniken and Wrangel
Each found success, but then each faced abject catastrophe
Trotsky led the Red army, with a flexible stance he had won
When the Russian state and the Soviet Union reawakened
They had false starts, disasters, mistakes of consequence
When Stalin became leader, dark story grew more dark
Few were unaffected, the years served as memory
To avoid more division, the union was of steel
The world was afire, the populace would be lost
But the sole power that might save all of them
Was spent upon realms of the flesh and bones
Burnt remains as smoke covering the sky black
The generations sought pleasure without a cost
Built great altars to their flesh to every horizon
As they've planted a dead Moloch upon a throne
Dead outnumber the living, birthing plagues
Our fate has yet to be sealed, it is undecided
But this world will never see that time
It lingers there, in death's lavish hold
Waiting
Dropped into a world of flesh, a spirit shook off the ink
My words were never fully understood, even as I'd tried
These are dreams of a mad mind, everything out of sync
Imagining I can never truly live, demanding my egocide
Trapped by a physical, material world, too hard to think
In ideas found inside, deeply hiding, for fears to decide
My life a catastrophe, coping skills pushed to the brink
I am lost, despite being in the same place where I died
In a silence, my life always too loud, I needed a quiet
I gave all my ink to earn the final silence in my life
Part 1
Named by parents as Hartwig, I can't remember them
I now was a thrall, slave of a forge for the tribe Norse
My tribe was slaughtered in raids, all dead save for me
I was found hiding, a 5 year old so scared I wet myself
They thought I was amusing, I thought they smelled
In their village, it was cold always, I barely survived
Needed to quickly learn working the forge, it was Hell
In the village they were warriors and traded all goods
Winters were cold, beyond cold, beyond feeling warm
I was told I'd lived 15 years and allowed me to decide
Remain a thrall slave, or become one of their village
I'd have to learn to bear a shield and a sword, if I did
I chose to fight, a forge burned when one drew close
I was given then a new name, Hrafen, I'd bear it well
Ready for battle after training, stopped at the Faroes*
We drank and ate our fill, took to our ships, intense
In our day we became the Saxon shore's nightmare
Returning to the village let me feel as if I belonged
Not a slave, adopted, the time remembered in song
* or the old Norse name: Færeyjar
At last a human breathed air, it took many decades
Mars wasn't our species' first home but it'd work out
It was close enough to Earth, newly made fertile
Waters long, deep had carved scars deep upon Mars
And then colonists arrived, after drone terraformed
The decade of work, moss colonies were implanted
A Red planet was now oxygenated, becoming green
Believe: a world that could sustain oxygen required life
Sustaining native plants and dormant lakes and rivers
The change was in the end a rebirth, a new salvation
A home, one we had to work to bring into being
A time when humans were without awareness
In context of the era or perception of the past
All our actions silent, our life left no evidence
The footprint of our species were meaningless
Unless we kill the earth, by neglect or by war
Nuclear weapons will kill a planet, a warming
We live upon a timeless source of life, warning
This world should almost certainly survive us
Shame comes from the fact that of our hubris
And we're singularly motivated to destroy it
“It was reasonable to struggle, to suffer, perhaps
even to die, for a more just, a more compassionate
society, but not in a world with no future where, all
too soon, the very words "justice,""compassion,"
"society,"struggle,""evil,"would be unheard echoes
on an empty air.” P.D. James
During an era of a golden age, the state called
Those born to farming families, labor hardened
The state had called on them as recruit soldiers
Children of a plow had attachments to their land
They were loyal and they'd no reason to mistrust
Offers from the state mixed serving and a reward
The wars they'd then fought, thinned the number
In that service, the backbone of Rome weakened
After battles, the cost was fewer farmer soldiers
There'd now be less of labor hardened strength
Fewer could serve and vote, to work the land
Many lost their farms, by virtue of being gone
Then elite bought the lands that birthed men
Who were well able to carry out labors of war
Farms failed, but not the fields they were rich
While the lands were then worked by slaves
The farm born soldiers if not killed, still lost
This is the case of America, in wars for oil
The wars to support the false democracies
Soldiers once gave everything, but at home
Their farms failed, auctioned off, by elites
Cynical use of honorable humans endures
As banners differ the false hope goes on
The states let these honorable men die
In service of elite wealth and resources
They'll someday experience the harvest
No one will still remain to then serve
For farmers a harvest was genuine
A cynical elite, wealthy and powerful
These are the true rulers of the state
A state who will call out with offers
Offer up those who serve on altars
With a harvest as manifest slaughter
I never could comprehend the master's plan
My hope flowed and ebbed, didn't understand
In dreams of the life of peace was never mine
My existence was a mistake of living, of time
A life I was called to live is beyond my hands
And I can only stare off into the stars, sublime
The world is magnificent, but I'm dirty, empty
The dreams of a insane mind can become true
So I will long look at that planet and dream
Until death and silence no longer tempt me
To drink from the horn of a defeated beast is not mockery
It is a connection, a memory, its a cup to celebrate victory
Future humans won't know how it was to live in this time
Same to say for our ancestors of the past, we do not know
Judgment from the unwise who cannot understand is folly
The world lives now, we can't return to the past or future
Instead of feeling superior or inferior, understand the now
Its all you have, its all you can know with any certainty
Rising from his position on the beach, he focused
Going from prepared to the warrior sent to attack
The FSSF preparation and training was grueling
But this moment would free up Anzio's beach
Elite skilled and trained soldier, unafraid, anxious
Killing others, firing down at one as he climbed
A collision about to happen, impact was relentless
The Nazis called them Black Devils, barely knew
How deeply different these men were from them
While he found and went over the wall, into fire
Shooting until he'd no more ammo, struck down
Then rolling from the tumult, would die if left
Four had come to pull him to safety, and died
Finally even stretcher teams came to save him
But didn't survive their effort to save his life
FSSF "Blacky" Strecker, managed to live
Living a life afterwards on borrowed time
And making every second worth living
IN A MOMENT, HE SURVIVED BUT OTHERS DIED
Alex Ness 2026© Dedicated
Watching each person, while shining in a spotlight
The darkness full and abject, my stain's permanent
Into the void despise all I've done, left undone
Blackholes spit me out, I'm remaining still rejected
My being is left now a broken vessel, gone
To grieve, some people choose to retreat
And they lose contact as others move on
Others don't know the loss, or how it felt
With no hope upon the morning horizon
That life lost calls out, amidst the defeat
Death isn't something feared, no not now
There's no fear, only of being left behind
Again by an other like one once loved
There is only exhausted thoughts
These men fought for a people, as armed saints
Taking nothing in return, they'd meant only well
Defending the poor and meek, with arms and war
When the harvesters took lives and removing gold
All were turned back, fleeing from fields in defeat
Saints lived among those they'd helped after war
Of the tales they avoided what people would tell
How these armed men fought and left many scars
But in darkness the foe again rose, in winds cold
The saints had somehow renewed people and land
Giving of a future, the band of men fought well
Knowing the future is bright, by works of the hand
And they fought again, at last, to let the others live
As life has little else, but to love, and to forgive
Oh great Darius, we've known of your hunger, for Greek lands
But now your warriors bleed and they've their skulls crushed in
They followed your orders, men of the entire Persian Empire
As they've now been fully stopped on the beaches of Marathon
You sought our land, desired to kill or to enslave the Greeks
War was the test, but you failed, you've numbers but no power
Aimed towards villages and Athens, your violence rushing in
What's left of a dream, are we called to be foes, I don't know
So flee, pray your ships launch, instead of on burning shores
We're Greek and elect leaders, not monarchs, fields go fallow
The runner Pheidippides, gasping out his final breath,
Left us his message in death, "Rejoice, for we win!"
Steel is muscle, point of view armor and weapon
Fire is the inspiration inside the one, the warrior
Fields are splattered in blood, after Armageddon
Those dreaming of peace can become notorious
For being pacifist yet with a great ability to fight
Finding light in day, and a darkness in the night
Move and strike, and find themselves victorious
A pacifist found inspiration to act due to the foe
Then return to peace with the new knowledge
Acting ethically, the esteem in others grows
Never push those morally opposed to fighting
To then fight, use their steel, feel their fire
To defend themselves, foolishly tested
When two notorious or evil powers fight each other, it is common to hope they
both destroy the other. The war did choose a winner, but it didn't destroy that
power, it pressed reset upon their journey. Calling the battle on the Eastern front
the Great Patriotic War the Soviet Union made memory of purges and hunger
feel like it was done for a higher cause. Obviously many authors have had many
different opinions.
People often see existence as an accident, I've no doubt
My life has seen great mercies, favors, along with grace
As a child of rape, I was a burden, I could be cast out
Allowed to die due to abortion, and exist as a memory
Instead I was allowed, instead, to become life, a being
My adoptive parents gave me a life, one worth living
My DNA mother allowed life, with abortion nullified
Later I was to become a father, I'd then have a legacy
I saw life from a perspective that was cold and wrong
Life isn't about goal and victory, it is not a transaction
Experiencing love, giving life, my life has a meaning
They laid there on a field of battle, confluence of bodies
Crimson red on all victims, the allegiance didn't matter
Each end of bayonet, both attacker and victim, a human
Reasons for the battle, being a cause of that catastrophe
Heroism or fear, courage or fleeing, the reasons scattered
In this war there are no winner, many losers, confusion
End allowing only decay, flesh in corruption, shattered
All ended life by violence, chance and circumstance
“Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor
how justified, is not a crime.”
My existence was not an accident, despite the rape of a woman
Instead, I was allowed life, from the chance, she had saved me
Instead of life, I could've been sucked from the uterus, aborted
If I'd been called into being in the past, I'd be seen as inhuman
Now a bastard child, given up in adoption, society betrayed me
Mistaking the child for acts against a mother, my truth distorted
Life goes on, regardless of consent, so create your own truth
The hollow, the empty, the waiting mother of a missing daughter
Lives abandoned, the violence towards each other, and slaughter
The worlds lost were never out of view, but remain out of reach
Fleeing lives we had, all in decay and entropy, our city besieged
Never lasting, in now every city of dreamers can no longer sleep
"The entropy of a closed system never
decreases. Every process must by law
decay." Author Anthony Doerr
In moments we thrive as we love
Time can be the quickest journey
For hunger or labors, it is enough
As all our time ticks away, mercy
Time teaches truths to the student
We can't afford to miss the point
For in the end, we all await
The final exam is hard
But it is fair
In slaughter of battle all true warriors are found
Bearing witness to the killing as some celebrate
Proof of their industry and expertise, holy ground
Heroism found on either side, not touched by fate
Warriors, war is not a test, nor machine of policy
A bestial dance of violence, immune to prophecy
The end is coming, dreams of warriors are unkind
This world is not enough, we are limited, by time
Speaking to our flesh, hurry, we've nothing more
As warriors surrender their will, dying by choice
The wars of our living days must thin the numbers
The few survivors will still raise their weak voice
Offering to the creator, their life, and only praise
Longing for Heaven's wonder, to him I pray
I'm unlike the others, long to know my creator
Here is our king, I long to now meet his gaze
Knowing he's always been waiting and true
His ways are not secret, his offerings proof
The Gods came from so far away, but made transit in a blink
Distances meant nothing, if needed they might move planets
The star Sirius was home to gods, as Orion's belt that of more
All in furor over the response, in over how one should think
A human, king, a people called him a god but he choose one
Who would now arise as sun god Aten, the focus of power
Their anthems and praise echo still, in the sky voices, soar
Akhenaten divested the priests of power, gods now ignored
Built Armana, devoted a city to Aten's high reign of power
Priests plotted revolt, counter religious revolutions, return
Akhenaten's new order was a moment, as many called a rise
To restore the world to sanity, restoring worship of all gods
The world was lost, for 17 years, and by his blood, he died
Sun disc and Aten remembered in the awakening of Ra
Soon enough however, many Gods were to be cast aside
As masses discovered a new divinity, remembering one
This God was the creator, avenger, harvester and master
This Aten perhaps was served in Heaven by Akhenaten
He was surely no longer called holy by the Egyptians
By one who spent a life trying to share a revelation
