From ravensteel@usa.pipeline.com Sun Aug 4 01:23:08 1996 Date: Tue, 9 Jul 1996 18:37:33 GMT From: Les McBride Reply-To: b5-creative@lists.best.com To: b5-creative@lists.best.com Subject: Al and David AU (poem) Hi, all, me again. After finishing the trilogy, I went back to pick up again in my own universe. I read some of my older stuff to get back in the groove, and came across this. I wrote it years ago in senior English (not "for", mind you, "in") for something that happens in my universe, but what struck me is how true it rings to some of what happens in Al and David's universe. So here it is, very minorly edited from my original, and put into this universe. I don't normally attempt poetry. Prose is difficult enough for me. This is one of the few I've even kept. Hope you like. Comments and flames alike will be welcomed. ***** "Song of Earth" Atrib. T. Dain First appeared in 2310, but almost certainly written earlier. Never more shall we walk the green, green grass of home, Never more to roam the cool, green hills of Earth. Gone are the deer from the greenwood fair. Burnt are they: burnt by the folly of man. Gone are the cities of man, leveled by the death-wind Shrieking from pole to pole. Burning tears trickle down my face as I see the devastation for The millionth, the billionth, the trillionth time. I look at the once-living planet, now just another dead cinder Spinning through the heavens. But, "Where life remains, there is hope" the sages said, Not knowing the truth they spoke. For the sweeping death-lord has left some Who realize their forbears ways. Grieving, they cry aloud "Never again shall such as this happen!" Perhaps they are right. Who can say. Sight blurred with tears, heart heavy with memories, But forseeing the dawn of a new era I set out to build a new life in the vastness of space Surrounded by but a few, all would I count as the Thousandth. Knowing not how to do it, yet we shall, brother, We shall. May there always be strong me to carry on when others fall. May this never happen to another world. May we succeed. Wish us luck. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Leslie C. McBride ravensteel@usa.pipeline.com ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Because peace is sometimes another word for surrender. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------