Two Wars

Of all the wars you've fought,
Which one is etched along your headstone,
Bygone, remote, and cast aside?
Did you hold it in your hands every single night?
Did you wash them in the waters of a grave?

Silence in sovereign fleet the hand that dare seize the fire.
Struggle to sound above the piercing,
Echo trill of this hapless, bloody sigh.
Stalking in this fearful symmetry the trail back,
To the hammer, the chain, and the furnace.

Slowly they will tarnish and break.
The tiger utters not his own name.
And in triumph, and in glory,
Our earth is blackened.
In solace do we sing.

I'm not ashamed.
If blood is what you ask,
Then I have nothing to offer.

Your ghost is leaving; it has undone itself.
In death they do speak low into our ears,
"I've been waiting for this,"
Unchanging.