Battle Chant for the Children of Athena

A Poem by Matthew

Written as a College Student (2000-2006)

The paean resounds across the battlefield, deep and Doric, a spoken memory of the sons of Herakles. Their cloaks lash one another across the shoulders, rust-red to mask their blood. They march, for the death of ideals and the enslavement of races, for the pitiless murder of infants upon the rock altars of blood purity.

Reflecting a dipping red sun off their polished bronze shields, stalwart in the face of the advancing death, the sons of the Owl-Eyed Goddess pray to their Protectress for courage. They stand as free men, defiant of Doric arrogance, unafraid to die for the safety of democracy that the unbridled potential of all men may advance in art, literature, science and ethics. They pray that Glaukopis, the great and glittering Princess of the Heavens whose strong right arm slew the titans and whose power compelled all gods to bend the knee in awe, will empower them to defend Her city and offer praise of Nike as Her handmaid.

As the thunderous collision of Peloponessian phalanxes breaks like a wave upon their Ionic rocks, the clouds part and She casts the lightning bolt of Her father to open the slaughter of the red ranks of death that Her children, blessed by Her, need not shrink back but proudly stand shield to shield.