Upon the Sea of Anarchy: Canto I

Canto I

A freedom fighter fighting all the lands

Upon the earth is hardly how I saw

Myself a few long years ago. Demands

Upon one’s life can change one’s destiny:
A news reporter finds that he commands

An army to protect a floating city,

A city he helped build, so he’s be free.

Conditions in the city have turned gritty,

But I will not surrender up my life.

But if I did, don’t look on me with pity –

I will have given up my life to make

A chance for liberty to live. This knife,

This gun will draw blood if they must. I shake

Because I’ve never killed a man. I will,

Though, if I must – whatever it will take

To keep my love, my life, my home upon

The sea, my wife and family, fulfill

This high ideal upon the sea. The dawn

Shows ships surrounding us. Will we go down

Below the waves? Will all our work be gone?

It happened once before, before I saw

The consequences of – now what’s that noun? –

I will not call progressive such a law

Of changeless change as I believed in once.

An advocate of power, pure and raw

Is what I was, and what I sought to show

Was justice. That was back before this bunce

That brought me happiness, that made me grow

Into  a true adult, who did not need

A parent who would keep me in my row.

I see you think I am too much – I lose

You in my rhetoric. But let me feed

Your curiosity. I was a news

Man like yourself. Like you, I went to see

A city, free, that soon became my Muse.

I guess I cannot hide my hope that you

Will follow the same narrow path as me,

As I once did. I know that nothing drew

You here – like me, your editor said, “Go,”

And so you came to find out what I knew.

Canto II