Who Shall Sing, When Man is Gone -- Wisdom (poem) by Robert G. Brown on AuthorsDen

Who Shall Sing, When Man is Gone -- Wisdom
by Robert G. Brown → (All Poetry by Robert G. Brown)
Rated "G" by the Author.

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Who Shall Sing, When Man is Gone is a collection of poems built around the title poem, which is an epic dedicated to nuclear war under the premise that if such a war ever occurred, it would be worthy in its own way of a Homeric epic, only there would be no one around to write it. In addition to this epic poem, there are many poems long and short that examine life and death, society and its cruelties and benefits, nature, and love. Quite a few poems are devoted to philosophy and quiet meditations. Enjoy.

Wisdom Hear me. Though I am young, with beard ungreyed yet I am wise, for I have lived a thousand lives. Hear me. I have lived true and strong unswayed by the winds of deceit returned honor with honor and betrayal with ruth and vengeance. Hear me. I have lived false and sly forsworn my friends and allegiance grown fat on the blood of the fools who trusted me. I have grown old and died alone, and forsaken surrounded by my kin and loved ones either way. Hear me. I have been bold in love, and shy, repulsed now, seduced another time, kept faith for a lifetime, slept with whoever I choose, discovered that whichever path you take at the end of that path you lose. Hear me. I have fathered many children mothered them too some of them the Gods and borne them in blood and pain cut the cord and hushed their first cry nursed them at my breasts spitted them on my red sword watched them piled in pits and burned. Have none of them learned? My son turns the furnace on splendid in his black helmet to burn the cold and broken body of my son. I have watched my children grow old foolish and wise while I have died young died old and childless died in my daughter's arms and buried a daughter. I, too, have known the rage of a babe whose life, unrequited, ended in the hateful night. Hear me. I have beguiled the King a thousand times with tales of brave Ulysses. I have finally washed my guilty hands and put away the sword of my vengeance to live in harmony and peace though a monster am I. I have seen the error in my ways repented in leisure regretted a still--borne past and all the chances missed to sin. Hear me. For I have seen the world destroyed in strange ways destroyed it myself, in a fit of passion and watched in wonder as new worlds were hurled like dice, or bubbles from my fingertips. I have been God Odin walking with my ravens and patch Krishna seeking to kill my cousins and Satan, too. Lucifer am I, fallen angel Promethean in my pride, which abides the rending in hope that from all of the ending a new thing is born. I have walked the golden road sailed the seas fought in the trenches cast a spell and been bewitched and once, long ago weaved a web to save some pig which started my feet on the path to wisdom. Ah, yes. I am wise, full of the borrowed wisdom of ten thousand, a hundred thousand lives each seen through the filter of their brightest moments. the shared experience of the generations is at my command leading me, though blind I be, a poet through the empty deserts and hollow hills the wasted spaces of the living land. Hear me. From these myriad flames I have learned that power and money, false immortality are fruitless goals burned by the aims themselves consumed to ash and scattered in the winds of time. Long life is illusion, and greed is no end. We take from our life what we bring but since that forever is beyond our grasp books are the next best thing. To Patrick, William, Sam and all the children of the world...