An English poem.
I stand for Empire. So many hierarchies
Under the One Crown, so many races
In grand order mixing
At durbars, and markets,
And harbours, so many rituals
To the One God and the Many Ones.
Empire is vista. Earth’s ends
Nearer, time shorter, more notes
On logbooks, more friends to call.
Or ebriety. I am drunken
With the ever-accumulating
Wealth of the world.
Gold. Silver. Diamonds. Ore.
Thick oil deep from deserts.
Coal from the recesses
Of hell. Timber from paradise.
Trunks red or black,
Ebony, cedar, mahagonny.
Let it come to me loaded on
Iron cars and cursive boats,
On camels and elephants,
By air, on eagles wings, let it
Cross deserts wide and ascend
Spiraling roads under the one sun.
For those are the wars
Of the Lord. And let me then give profusely,
To every one, let me dissipate,
As much as I have amassed. Transmute riches into alms,
Wealth into art. From all nations tribute
Build houses for all nations.
Karavansarails. Colleges. Basilica.
Gates. Malls. Stock Exchanges. Hospitals.
Neither greed nor plunder,
Verily, but love. The unending
Outflow of love for the world of God.
Waters roaring and falling
From rocks so high.
For Empire is
What it was even before
Being thought of.
Not by my sword, not
By canons and fire
Has it been wrought out of nil.
Rather by spirit only. First was love.
First was God’s word and Adam
Giving a name to every animal and
Stone and plant in God’s world.
And Adam then studied the world
Even deeper and understood
The fabrics hidden of salt and sand,
And why storms and winds cut asunder
The sky. And dominion was given to Adam
Over the world he learned to know. And those who kept
Adam’s heritage they
Inherited the earth. They bound the lesser breeds
Into royal service and purpose,
Not by sword or canons, but rather
By knowledge and cypher and numbers,
And proper names for the ways of the earth.
Empire stands and will
Never dissolve
Even if the One Crown is gone
And durbars are no more under
The one sun. Once joined together
Races will forever each for the other
Long. Or so do I dream all my dreams
Along. Can I now forsake the smell
Of foreign flowers and the sight of trees
Unknown. Can feast now be held around me
Without dark wine and dark
Fiery pepper. Can I deny having slept
With daugthters from over the seas. Am I not
Willing to free my servants, my pupils,
And learn from their lore too. Have peers not been
Traded for equals, and scepters for codes.
Was not my dominion a mere preamble
To communion, measure for measure
And love for love under the sun.
Mistaken can I be. Can Adam be so wrong
As not to see rebellion’s fiery thunder
In Cain’s fiery eyes.
© Michel Gurfinkiel, 2007