fool,
braggart,
you stand now at your victory feast,
with your legion of
foul demons
whom you let loose from your own crumbling walls
to attack your friend and neighbor,
finding the battle un-winnable at home.
You armed them with
cudgels of reason,
shoddy yet durable, blunt and without grace.
You let them loose,
screaming and yammering,
from the city they have grown weary of raising,
and set them across the field to the tower on
the border lands.
Inside you found warriors and demons similar
yet unlike your own,
locked in their own private war,
so much so that you were unchallenged at the gate,
and unnoticed at the attack.
Your fell troops fought hard,
swinging at the faces of demons and warriors alike,
and only then was their presence noticed.
Attacks were then parried and delivered by those in the tower,
not with matched savagery but more all with
annoyance,
for as I mentioned, this was a private war, and your troops
were known as friends,
and not the vile disease of
enemy.
Many eon ago,
before you even knew you stood in a tower,
this private war began.
The
arms race was so heated that the cudgels of reason,
long ago ceased to wound warrior and demon alike.
Reason enjoyed a short reign in this house.
The
soul forge, in order to speed an end to this war,
or to at least cause casualty in order to decide the matter,
wrought weapons of
beauty and grace,
of understanding tempered with malice.
These
vorpal blades were then passed out
to each side,
and the battle was rejoined anew.
These same subtle blades were those
that went sniker-snact against your adolescent hordes,
and so heated with the fire of battle,
those deep wounds went unnoticed,
and even now, as your envoi returns,
having delivered the boastful parable of the tower,
and even now as you gorge yourself in self deluded victory,
even as you raise a toast to the might of your host,
razor thin wounds bleed crystal clear blood
to soak the very earth below your feet.
Self deluded victory because you wounded only one,
which I am thankful for…
the hideous demon of
self importance was dealt a serious blow,
when on the field he saw yours, huge and ugly,
blind and proud.
This day he is a smaller demon thanks to your assault.
You wounded one and killed another,
this one I was sad to see die,
for it was my respect for you
when I knew you
before
the war.
There is peace now if you wish it,
just as there was war when you desired it.
There is friendship now if you perceive it,
for I never attacked your walls.
“
please… less love and more common decency
.”
Save your raiding party for those who it will help,
or at least those it will hurt.