Part III · The Des Moines / Post-Military Era (2000–2015)
Three servants cared for their king
Who lay still on his bed.
The sweat of sickness was wet with a slickness
That reflected brightly upon his head.
They gave him water, they gave him food;
And into the hearth they added wood.
But the chill in the air was not from the cold
But from the old king whose own soul he had sold.
The king coughed weakly, spit glistened on his chin.
“My loyal servants, come listen!
I may now be dying, but I am not yet dead!
For gold and for silver much blood has been shed.
My soul is no more, my heart—it is stone.
My strength is but enough to lament what I’ve sown.”
The servants clasped his hands, one wiped his king’s face.
One said, “We are here, my Lord—we hear you, your grace.”
“So close to death, but still not too late—
To tell you how I’ve been fooled by fate!
This kingdom is built upon the sweat of slaves—
Whose masters were naught more than selfish knaves.
They worked for the whip, lived for the chain–
Suffered the sun and the pouring rain.
While the nobles, in inherited splendor,
Toasted with wine, enjoyed their meat tender.
And my father and I, as his father before him
Watched with a smile, over our own cup’s rim,
While our conquests abroad only brought in more slaves
To toil ’til their rest in unmarked graves.
“Yes, this is our legacy, the Realm of the Damned
Whose king is but a reflection of how it shall end.
As King I led my kingdom to greatness,
But I failed to bring its people along.
And that, you see, has been its weakness—
That was where I’d done great wrong.”
A cough shook the king, and his veins grew taut.
He choked out a sentence, his one final thought.
“All people are born free! Let it be as it aught.”
Composed 2001–2002 · part of the Poems collection · authorship documented on the Provenance page.