Not Since a Century Past

Not since a century long past

Has the Moon dethroned the Sun

From the two oceans so vast

That embrace the bald eagle’s son.

Not since a hundred years ago

Has the crown of fire been taken

By the mover of the tides that ebb and flow

By the pale, two-faced, ghastly maiden.

Not since the bloody apex of the First War

Have the cattle and owls been driven mad

By the mirage of Night from field to shore,

While countrymen stare upwards darkness-clad.

Not since the zeitgeist of patriotic wartime

Has the syzygy caused the world to tremble,

As priests warn of the wrath of gods sublime

And the wild eagle’s adversaries assemble.

Not since the age Man took to the clouds

Has totality cast the land of the beavers,

And the land where the palmettos form nervous crowds,

In the darkness they fear as eager sun-believers.

Not since the whole world was in ominous discord

Have the native elders prophesied a transformation,

While tribesmen from all Four Corners pay respects to their lord,

Who dies and is reborn in a ritual of sacred purification.

Not until seven, then twenty-eight years after today,

Will Selene twice more ambush Helios’s chariot afire,

And will the dark snake devour the gleaming egg laid by Day,

Before being frightened by Man’s screams and drums of ire.