Fragments from The Fall of the Sidhrateliu

This poem tells a bit of history from my invented world. Of course, the poem was written by one side of a fairly bloody conflict, so don't look for unbiased historical accuracy! It tells the story of the Alaaren Genocide during the First Caryan War and the subsequent droughts that led to abandonment of the Alaaren Plain. Composed February 2006.

In-world: by Chris Schaeffer, after a Noeli poem named 'Fall of the Sidhrateliu'.

I.

The people of the valley
met the people of the plain
on the green and glistening grassland
'neath the fiercely pounding rain.
There the people of the valley
loved the people of the plain
and with the people of the islands
forged themselves a fatal chain:
an empire built by workmen strong
by farmers stern and true,
by soldiers brave, by thinkers strange,
by leaders wise and merchants shrewd—
A nation doomed to failure
long before its very start
for the people of the canyon
had made violence their art.

II.

Now the people of the canyon
had long turned a jealous eye
toward the plains that lay to windward
and their fertile fields of rye
but silent brick-walled sentinels
kept them from rightful gain
for the masons of the valley
had built cities on the plain.

III.

Long sat the brooding Caryans
in their halls of polished rock
where not a sound dared echo
save the dripping of the clock;
'til stood the youngest Councilman,
made motion with his hand,
"Take heart," said he, "O Fathers wise,
and hearken to my plan."
Then sat they all in speechless thrall
this daring thing to hear
and not a man was in that hall
but that he turned his ear.
So malice woke in every eye
to see the hated plainsmen die
and take from them the ripened rye
that else were far too dear.

IV.

Then the people of the canyon
slew the people of the plain
whose bodies sank into the mud
made soft by blood and rain.
But the plainsmen worked a wonder
with their bitter, dying sigh
and swept the very raindrops
from their swiftly drying sky.
So since that time the wind blows wild
through withered fields of parchèd grain
and howls through the broken walls
of silent cities on the plain.
On that day an empire died
and will not rise again
for the iron chains that bound it
lie shattered on the plain.