Draining the Marshes
Along the marches they fought, into the marshes they sought, and they slogged and they slopped Seeking, ever seeking for those that went before. . . Brown water and mud: the black mere does not lie, but there many lie bodies, and no air A boy exploring the wood if he should call out in the wood. . . Father and friends, warring, fighting, a rout. They flee; they rest. This place is safe; it is good, they hear. Then the rains came. Wood became wet, Flat became flood, land became mud, dragging down men into marsh— down, down, through terra infirma, and no air Up swelled the swamp. Hill became barrow harbor became hell and hell became history Great praise and men live on, but where now the scops? Realms rise and fall, but the land remains. Behold the silent witnesses. (When heroic acts were systemic and everywhere harpers were heard Who guessed it should be that chemical reactions be louder than words?) The body dies, but little decays and stays to speak to us today with rotting eyes, and silent lays. The bog drains down, The buried come up up, up into the light preserved by that same deadly dark, revealed by their sons’ distant sons, into the air She broke this bone, right here she fell. He lived this way. He died this well. Helmets and rings honor and praise history, culture knowledge Light and dark bane and boon the bog.
—Eric Kingsepp
Eric Kingsepp recieved his B.A. and M.A. from Christendom
College. He is a member of the American Inklings writers’ group in
Washington, DC.
