The ink is flowing into the darkest century, where the machine meets the flesh, and the old world is ground into the mud of the trenches.
XXXI. The Sarajevo Spark
A motor stalls, a cooling summer breeze,
A pistol barks within the crowded street;
The ancient houses fall upon their knees,
As empires hear the drum’s insistent beat.
The cousin-kings send letters in the night,
While mobilization grinds its heavy gear;
The "lamps of Europe" lose their steady light,
To vanish in a fog of sudden fear.
The train-tracks groan beneath the weight of guns,
The youth of nations gather at the gate;
A million fathers sacrifice their sons,
Upon the altar of a blind and hollow state.
The long, Victorian summer meets its end,
As broken treaties fail to break or bend.
XXXII. No Man’s Land (The Trenches)
A world of wire, mud, and rotting wood,
Where rats are kings and gas is in the air;
The "glory" that the poets understood,
Is lost within a landscape of despair.
The whistle blows, the wave of khaki falls,
Against the rhythmic chatter of the lead;
While back at home, the list of names appalls,
A generation numbered with the dead.
The tank crawls through the crater and the slop,
A beast of iron in a world of clay;
The spinning world is forced to a sudden stop,
In this, the brutal, modern light of day.
The romantic soul is buried in the trench,
Amidst the cordite and the human stench.
XXXIII. The Red October (The Russian Revolution)
While shells explode upon the eastern front,
The Romanovs are huddled in the dark;
A hungry people bear the heavy brunt,
Until a frozen train brings back the spark.
The Winter Palace falls to worker’s hand,
As "Peace and Bread" becomes the holy cry;
To redistribute every inch of land,
Beneath a red and revolutionary sky.
The old world’s wealth is seized by common law,
As councils rise to take the place of kings;
But power finds a sharp and hungry claw,
And soon a dark and iron curtain swings.
The experiment of history begins,
To wash away the old and czarist sins.
XXXIV. The Silver Screen (The Birth of Cinema)
A flickering light against a velvet wall,
Where shadows move and silent lovers kiss;
The masses gather in the darkened hall,
To find a brief and cinematic bliss.
The camera captures every tear and smile,
To broadcast dreams across a flickering wire;
The world is entertained for just a while,
By images that feed a new desire.
The myth is modern now, the stars are born,
In shades of gray and black and brilliant white;
To comfort those by war and labor worn,
Within the theater’s artificial light.
The narrative of man is framed in gold,
As every secret of the heart is told.
XXXV. The Jazz Age (The Roaring Twenties)
The saxophone begins its crooked wail,
As hemlines rise and champagne bottles pop;
The old morality is thin and frail,
In clubs where syncopations never stop.
The radio brings music to the room,
While skyscrapers defy the heavy ground;
A manic dance to banish every gloom,
As wheels of industry go spinning round.
The credit flows, the ticker-tape is long,
A house of cards built on a rising high;
The world is drunk on money and on song,
Beneath a bright and neon-colored sky.
But shadows lengthen on the Wall Street floor,
As poverty prepares to knock the door.
XXXVI. The Hollow Eye (The Great Depression)
The ticker-tape is silent in the street,
As breadlines stretch across the city square;
The arrogance of wealth is in retreat,
Before the gray and hollow-eyed despair.
The dust bowl blows across the western plain,
To bury every hope in bitter sand;
The labor of the years is all in vain,
Within a dry and unrewarding land.
The factories are quiet, cold, and still,
The golden promise turns to heavy lead;
A test of spirit and a test of will,
For every family crying out for bread.
The gears have jammed, the marble’s luster fades,
As life retreats into the darker shades.
XXXVII. The Gathering Storm (The Rise of Fascism)
A voice of thunder in a public square,
The rhythmic tread of boots on cobblestone;
A promise made to banish all despair,
And place the nation on a central throne.
The uniform becomes the only skin,
The scapegoat found to carry every blame;
The doors are locked to keep the "stranger" in,
As embers grow into a hungry flame.
The orator demands a blind belief,
To heal the wounds of a humiliated pride;
A sudden and a terrifying relief,
That sweeps the soul upon a darkling tide.
The stage is set, the black shirts find their place,
To bring a shadow to the human race.
XXXVIII. The Split Atom (The Manhattan Project)
Within the desert of the silent sand,
A secret sun is gathered in a core;
The cleverest of minds within the land,
Prepare a final, devastating war.
The math of Einstein meets the engineer,
To unlock power from the tiny seed;
A marriage born of genius and of fear,
To satisfy a dark and desperate need.
The flash of white consumes the morning light,
A pillar of fire reaches for the sky;
The world is changed within a single sight,
As ancient gods begin to wonder why.
"I am become Death," the creator cries,
While ash and shadow fall from open skies.
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