Does the armored man, the proud Praetorian

riding on his great tall horse

across the foreign landfells of field and thatch huts

ever hear the acrid clarion call

of common humanity sighing?


I did not ask, before he passed on, the question

that lingered on my mind, remembering the days

of logic and rhetoric the master had taught

before the busy streets collapsed our constructions

I did not ask, nor did I offer insults

as others sometimes do


and good it was for his comfort that I did not speak

(even in my coarse Castilian tongue)

for surely even in my babble he could not have failed

to recognize his people's own Philosopher:

That, though words be not the same

the passions of the soul are the same for all

and, hearing, to lay down his shield and bow


But who would make the wars if the Praetorian no more rode?

Against whom would I grit these teeth of protest

what metaphors would we draw from a world

made only of peaceful lanes and harvests?

our struggles laid aside, where would come the poets

to write the darker dreams of our capacities?


I held my tongue against the violence

and tended my intellect in silence