Epic Poem (call for a collective project)

I understand now, if not, I’ll wing it anyway.

The rain washed over the Stone walls and streets.

The young prince loved the Rain, it was always serene to his eyes, the tint of Blue upon the land, the Fresh smell and soothing Sound.

He requested music to be played while he watched this and contemplated the conflict in his mind, the distress, the anxiety and Confusion.

He seeked to calm his mind from all disturbances and the Rain and Music aided him in this.

And of a sudden, all things which afflicted, disturbed and haunted the young prince were slowly seeping out of him - washed away by the magical ethereal blendings of sound; and thus, it appeared, that his Spirit rose up and took on another form, another shape. He looked about him and within his new calm composure and the freshness of his eyes’ perceptions, everything seemed as if it had been re-created in the moment, including the prince himself. He felt the Phoenix within rise up and he sought impatiently to continue on with his journey. A lark, as if sensing this deeper more meaningful metamorphosis of a man, and its own essence within that man, flew to the prince’s shoulder and there perched, thereby joining its fate and allegiance to that of the prince evermore.

The lark resting on the Prince’s shoulder; gone from the two combatants, weary of such an unnatural sight, a battle that seemingly would never end, two equals that couldn’t let the fight be for another day.

The battle then unseen now lied in the casm of history, only one remained that we can be sure, one that rested, bled and even gained new resolve, but resolve to come much later.

But the one that remained bleeding on the field, seeped into the moist ground, and the lark sang twice, in order to remind his true mission. Out of the ground like a plant a pod grew formed out of his blood…

He opened the pod and closed it immediately because it contained his likeness.

He remembered a long time before the battle that it was prophesied that those who go down into battle and survive alone, have to bear the brunt of ridicule and exile. Which meant choosing one of three paths. Monastery, exorcism, or flight. He knew flight was out of the question, monastery did not take in anyone except hermetic virgins, so there remained exorcism.

The exorcist recently left the western town, so he thought only of training the man inside to be his exorcist.

   The man was his perfect likeness except his hair was like of Medusa, and he remembered the warning : never ever to look at him.

 The castle in the foreground was ominous, and he cut off the pod because it was almost ripe, took it up upon his back and slowly trudged toward the silvery lined beclouded castle, with turrets into the vast sky disappearing until he came to the moat, where the draw-bridge, as if on cue, slowly descended.

Aware of the old myths he knew that a mirror may be of paramount importance, but thought better of it; to turn to stone was not his worry, not one anyway to compare to looking into his own reflection, one who’s hair to him too resembled serpents and who’s visage cemented his heart as any mythical curse.

His own visage, that face that while aged still resembled that of his youth, the one that upon sighting would cast him into himself; that being who he would be for eternity.

No scars and weathering could erase that risk, the risk that the bygone days still would show through, pressing him, into an eternity, a destiny; that for which he feared greater than any other.

No birds prowled the death ridden air. No prey on this side of the horizon. Slaves died every day, a child was born on the second moon after our departure. Great evils this kid must overcome, even if his death allows him to flee before we reach our destination, the lord of Hawks, the iron fist of the north, the keeper of the mine.

In the castle of the Wolf, the Prince Archibald was playing with a golden ring. His right hand was a bit bloody.

The Princess Adenah had caught her Archibald flirting with the scullery maid and felt the angry fire within. She flew over to him in a rage, appeared to lovingly take his hand, but bit down so hard she broke skin and left his hand a bloody mess. Alas, his own anger took control of his animal nature and he slowly began to morph into the large wild black wolf that he tried to hold at bay. His howl could be heard echoing through the chambers of the castle.

Slowly, he returned to his human nature, picked up the bloody ring, put it on his finger and walked to the bedchamber of his great love. "Aye, I shall slowly appease the fire within her belly.

In the yearly years, there was nothing to drink either, so all life died.

Fire! Fire makes the vines bleed.

But ice cracks rocks and makes caves where fire can dwell.

“That’s what we called the pods over the genetic combinations of horse and elephant that we had created. Sarcophagi… the chariots pulled by steeds of Hell.”

One of the sarcophagi exploded in the night and caused many deaths among our slaves and animals and some of the sons were wounded and blood penetrated into the crevices of the lifeless tomb which we traversed and which once was called Earth and now Cloud Alpha Zero after the neural net that had caused all this assimilation and the resulting erosion of life; a medal on the chest of the great King who as we speak travels by only lightcenturies off, nearly colliding with out plans, and thereby ruining his own future sons chance to figure in a heroic tale worth the salt on our backs… so it came that we had to stall our efforts to disclose the bridge across yet another hellish crevice of warped fates and sit at the edge for a while, contemplating our luck and smoking cigars as we called the dried leaves in which we wrapped the herbs we had brought from the Vaults in orbit Q.

The light disappeared from the roads.
In the early years, there was nothing to drink either, so all life died.
Fire! Fire makes the vines bleed.
But ice cracks rocks and makes caves where fire can dwell.
O Hera! Woe to those who cast steel onto water

The light disappeared from the roads.
In the early years, there was nothing to drink either, so all life died.
Fire! Fire makes the vines bleed.
But ice cracks rocks and makes caves where fire can dwell.
O Hera! Woe to those who cast steel onto water
For steel must be cast unto steel, by Ares

The light disappeared from the roads.
In the early years, there was nothing to drink either, so all life died.
Fire! Fire makes the vines bleed.
But ice cracks rocks and makes caves where fire can dwell.
O Hera! Woe to those who cast steel onto water
For steel must be cast unto steel, by Ares
Or by Hefaestion set to rock

Where old Kronos holds it fast, before the day breaks in a new king.

The count of the army was twentyscore and threescore long ships

The oars ploughed the darkening sea and sped the black ships onward like Apollos plague-bringing arrows.

And the maids bid them goodbye with a silent shaking of their scarfs