I SHALL NOT DIE HERE (BALLADE OF A WARRIOR BOUND)

I SHALL NOT DIE HERE (BALLADE OF A WARRIOR BOUND), by Jason M. Waltz:

Pulled taut, Oh! so painfully taut,
cold links stretched tight — chains
draped in quantities self-wrought.
Loathed, debased, abused — endless pains
never dimming, never hiding darker stains
of iniquities untold, retold, sold ado . . .
All lost; empty favors and false gains
bury golden cast, pate, and sinew.

Rattle empty scabbards fraught
with fears and lies and endless blames.
Never enough answers sought
in the wrong places — just abundant shames,
broken swords’ slashes. Eviscerated, drains
away, bids away lore’s core to whore anew
might’s once terrible arm — fame’s
own golden cast and pate and sinew.

Splintered bones and gnashing teeth bought
with bloodied style by questing thanes
drowning in the battles they have fought
‘gainst wretched man and beast. War’s insanes
granted peace and plows and grains —
extremely lost at cost, Oh! what cost! To do
it so and live again as banes
to golden cast and pate and sinew.

Master I cannot be sans the hope, the aims
to satisfy; sigh. Belie the few
who dare calls craven and renames
my golden cast, pate and sinew.
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Jason M. Waltz writes. Not as often as he’d like, nor often as well as he should, but write he does. He also believes in heroes and in being inspired by them and in sharing them. He’s published a number of heroes at Rogue Blades Entertainment, and is thrilled every time one of his own attempts at defining heroics — of putting the hero back into heroics — makes it before readers.