Blackened, burnished stone affords,
The whisp’ring marks hist’ry records.
Castle walls and turrets, steep
Cannot reveal what mem’ries keep.
To regale and live a mêlée’s scourge
Is concealed behind a funeral dirge:
Past long ago, while children cried,
Asking Fate why father died.
Razing trumpets assault stale air.
The missiles launched, fly with prayer,
Assembling those in their sounding:
Review, acclaim the castle’s founding.
Knights rise and fall, o’er field in battle,
The distance quiets saber’s rattle.
Though most come to fight and die,
The victor’s few, recall with sigh:
Cold iron lance from foeman’s camp
Dealt stumbling blow as they advanced,
To crumble walls, of stone and blood,
Could not resist that human flood.
Rolling towers from foreign land,
Bury all before whom stand:
Launching boulders, flaming, strike
Quenching life and dreams alike.
Ere mother’s days of babes were crushed,
For in strong keep defiled, hushed
Through smoke and ash where hope played
Survivors knelt, sobbed mercy, prayed.
Decrees once forged, forgotten, vie
To sail chilled air as arrows fly,
Loosed free, hit mark, or else fall shy,
While lords lament and widows cry.
The screws are turned in hate’s device,
Castle walls cannot stop vice,
Nor greed arrayed in power’s grip,
When icy hearts have kissed war’s lips.
