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[elsajeni]

yeah. poem. newly written. english homework. lengthy.

go look. tell me the odds on a sappy english teacher liking it.


I was a soldier.
They called me brave, valor’s minion,
An eagle, a lion, a cannon, in human form.
Honors were predicted, and honors were given,
A new title, new land, yet still one honor remained,
The hereafter I was promised
On a blasted, wintry heath.
I ushered him into my home,
The man whose life I was promised,
Whose life I swore to take,
Whose life I swore to protect
Even with my own.
All the while, silent, I prayed
That no light, no fire of star or moon,
Might touch my dark desires.
I feared to see that which I longed to do.
I was kinsman, subject, host,
And all of these spoke to conscience,
But conscience bows before ambition,
Kneels, and backs away. How dare I?
I dared not, yet I would, and settled to it,
The one who they called brave
At last surrendering.
A dagger rose before me, my own,
And yet remained unreachable –
Again I wondered, dare I?
The bell sounded, summoned me, summoned his soul.
I dared. I went, and it was done.
Sleep, the innocent and the vulnerable,
That which is harmed, though it harms none –
This I murdered.
Again and again, this I murdered.
They told me he would take my throne – I murdered.
They told me he defied me,
Fled to England, would not yield – I murdered.
A thousand times, I murdered.
Ghosts walked before me, night and day,
Too like the ghost of a dagger,
Too like the conscience that had knelt too early.
They told me, then, that I lay invincible,
No man could hurt me, no army prevail,
And I was young still, and brash,
And took them at their word.
I am a thousand years older now.
I have no love, no friends, no honor,
Only curses, uttered where none can hear.
She is dead who urged me on;
What now compels me? I could yield.
Yield, if I chose, to a boy still beardless,
One who has never done battle, never bled.
Signs, those which the sisters prophesied,
Those impossible – men not of woman born,
A walking wood –
They approach now. Life is empty, dark,
A candle burning briefly in the world,
And I am extinguished, finished, overcome.
His armies will breach my castle, death will come,
But I at least will die with armor on.


please note that many lines are either paraphrased or just plain stolen from macbeth. i assume shakespeare is unlikely to take offense.

Comments

[xenowolf4.livejournal.com]

guh? we have to write a poem for english????