Hawkman
02-22-2010, 12:56 PM
This one got a way from me a bit, the forms evolved and meandered like the journey, so I felt it proper to divide it into three. My biggest problem is that I keep lapsing into comic verse, it was a real sturggle to keep it vaguely serious.
The Boatman
Charon son of Erebus
Upon the River Styx did float
With empty purse he scanned the shore
For fares to carry as before
In ancient times there’d been so many
Thousands there had been to ferry
The reason for his boat.
Sculling gently on the deep
Reflecting on the lack of trade
“Can it be,” he asked the sky
“That systems of belief can die
Deprive me of my livelihood
Leave barren boards, where once there stood
The dead, as statues made?”
His eyes, no longer as they were
Augmented now by glass,
Yet saw with ease the glint of gold
Aloft, held high, with purpose bold
Enfolded in a gentle hand
The fee his labour to command.
Let not such customs pass.
The Passenger
The passenger was fair of face
Not aged and with such natural grace
The ferryman, compassion roused
(In hell this soul could not be housed)
Asked her whither she was bound
Strained to catch the softest sound
“Into the West,” she said.
“So many courses may I chart
But this for thee doth rake my heart
In that direction, there dwells Hades
(He’s not good company for ladies)
Can you not your wish make clear?
Take not the path, which leads to fear.”
Regarding him with eyes so blue
Eternity perhaps she knew
A goddess, chosen to descend
(The earth to walk, now at worlds end)
She took his hand and Westward peered
She wanted only one course steered
“To Elysium,” she said.
The Journey
“Ah,” quoth he, “for now I see
You seek to join a lover,
Don’t lie to me I’ll reject your fee
The truth I must discover.
Was he lost at sea
Unheeded pleas
Drowned in the tempest’s roar
A victim in this latter age
Of Poseidon’s endless, stormy rage
Or was he brave, by Ares felled
In death, his head, with sorrow held
By thee, sweet mystery?”
The maiden sighed and then replied
“There’s no enigma here
It is my time, I owed this debt
The fates at birth my span did set
Now, Charon, speak no more.”
In silence now the boatman steered
His ancient cheeks bereft of tears
Until at last the far shore reached
Into the West she stepped.
The Boatman
Charon son of Erebus
Upon the River Styx did float
With empty purse he scanned the shore
For fares to carry as before
In ancient times there’d been so many
Thousands there had been to ferry
The reason for his boat.
Sculling gently on the deep
Reflecting on the lack of trade
“Can it be,” he asked the sky
“That systems of belief can die
Deprive me of my livelihood
Leave barren boards, where once there stood
The dead, as statues made?”
His eyes, no longer as they were
Augmented now by glass,
Yet saw with ease the glint of gold
Aloft, held high, with purpose bold
Enfolded in a gentle hand
The fee his labour to command.
Let not such customs pass.
The Passenger
The passenger was fair of face
Not aged and with such natural grace
The ferryman, compassion roused
(In hell this soul could not be housed)
Asked her whither she was bound
Strained to catch the softest sound
“Into the West,” she said.
“So many courses may I chart
But this for thee doth rake my heart
In that direction, there dwells Hades
(He’s not good company for ladies)
Can you not your wish make clear?
Take not the path, which leads to fear.”
Regarding him with eyes so blue
Eternity perhaps she knew
A goddess, chosen to descend
(The earth to walk, now at worlds end)
She took his hand and Westward peered
She wanted only one course steered
“To Elysium,” she said.
The Journey
“Ah,” quoth he, “for now I see
You seek to join a lover,
Don’t lie to me I’ll reject your fee
The truth I must discover.
Was he lost at sea
Unheeded pleas
Drowned in the tempest’s roar
A victim in this latter age
Of Poseidon’s endless, stormy rage
Or was he brave, by Ares felled
In death, his head, with sorrow held
By thee, sweet mystery?”
The maiden sighed and then replied
“There’s no enigma here
It is my time, I owed this debt
The fates at birth my span did set
Now, Charon, speak no more.”
In silence now the boatman steered
His ancient cheeks bereft of tears
Until at last the far shore reached
Into the West she stepped.