occasus verum

They talk about aggression like the West invented it. Like before Europe there were never any wars, and no one died under the hand of his brother. Think state of nature, people. Today, in Iraq, we see what happens when you destroy the Leviathan and fail to replace it with an equal or greater authority: war breaks out, every man versus every man, and blood runs in the streets while child-bereft mothers wail in the darkness. But is this the legacy of the West? No, this is the legacy of all mankind. Who stormed the pass at Thermopylae ten years after coming ashore with hopes of plunder at Marathon? Who conquered west to the Straits of Gibraltar and east to the steps of Kashmir in less than a hundred years? Who assailed Constantinople for 800 years before finally achieving the bloody goal? The Crusades did not begin this clash of civilizations, they were merely another phase in a conflict that dates back to antiquity, even before the Son of Man walked the earth or the Prophet spoke aught of the mind of God.

La Reconquista

The jaguar rises,
he stalks forth from deserted
jungles in the south,
covering this land with
the sound of his mighty roar.

Above, the condor soars
in patient, watchful circles,
the rush of his wings
like thunder piercing through the sky.

vita est decorus

Sometimes life is too beautiful for words,
and you're left there stumbling, or silent,
searching in vain for breathtaking phrases
that just might explicate your ever-growing elation.

Anchors

I love using words
like never and always.
The weight of the certainty
they carry is like a massive anchor
Keeping my poems in calm, cool,
Coherent harbor waters.