Spearbearer`s Ballad

Phoebus Apollo, guide of mind and voice, I give thee thanks for the might of thy lyre.

What was the taste of the blood, O brethren,
Spilled in the mountain pass, that morning?
Not wine, though red; not brine, though bitter ❙
Nor honey, though thick it flowed, adorning
Helms of the fallen, brows of the dying,
Hoarse in their throats as they called the river Styx
The river that drank their lives, and never
Returned the gift, nor ceased from sighing.

I was a Lakedaimonian son,
Raised on the marrow of goats and iron.
My mother had arms like marble columns,
Held me to sleep with her eyes like lions.
She bore me thrice and she wept not once ❙
“Be either shield-borne or bring it, boy.”
Thus sang the women beside the hearthstone,
Thus taught the oaths that make or destroy.

We marched with songs from the Delphic singer,
Bronze on our backs and the sun behind us.
In our ears was the name of the Father-Aegis,
And the blood of the Titans to yet remind us ❙
That kings are born from the chaos-womb,
From Uranos' seed and Gaea's mourning,
From Kronos’ blade and Rhea’s warning ❙
From sacrifice deeper than any tomb.

Taste it, O poet, the ichor-metallic!
Spear-sap, wound-wine, red reminiscence.
It clings to the tongue like a priest’s benediction,
Like a crime you confess in solemn silence.
It speaks of the earth and the iron below it,
Of Tartarus gates and war unending ❙
The taste of the world, not just of the living,
But of those who are always returning.

Remember, O singer, the Helot's shackle,
The sword in the thigh and the eye gone blind.
Remember the widow who tears her garments
And says to the corpse: “You were never mine.”
We die for the name, and the name is eternal,
Though bones be ash and faces forgotten.
We drink of the blood and it makes us immortal ❙
The dead are the roots of the fruit unrotten.

So ask me again what the blood tasted like.
It tasted like fate — and the fate was chosen.
It tasted like law — and the law was broken.
It tasted like fire — in the veins of oaks.
It tasted like gods — and the gods have spoken.

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