The Savage State
In murky mists of timeless serenity
The gathering waters of combining entities
Greening pastures and competing trees
Wild forms flitter energy into the wind
With fire man’s natural tether is rescinded
Creatures hide from nature’s uncaring wrath
Pastoral State
The tired tilling of unwilling ground
Dependent on herd, to nature bound
In basic structures the eternal unfurls
Man makes his sacrifice in unknown world
An old man sits wondering man’s destiny
Children play as women dance free
The Consummation of Empire
Beings apart, beauty announced from high
Statues and trumpets call unto the sky
Ordered masses gather to temples adorned
With fountain springs, golden calf horns
A gentle sky, gentle wind for gentle boats
The empire of Man to the Gods gloat
Destruction
Whirlwind clouds whelm the troubled city
That worshiped power and showed no pity
The poison returned in a crashing storm
The masses flee or desperately pray
The dead collapse into a sea of torn
Sturdy rope of a sudden frightful fray
Desolation
A moon completes its course in dead sky
Moss grows where scattered fragments lie
Who lived among these ruins vast?
Into what destruction were they cast?
Lost to time what seemed eternal
Complacent hubris grants life infernal
This poem is inspired and based upon Thomas Cole’s series of paintings collectively known as The Course of Empire. I have reproduced the pictures from the Wikipedia page where you can learn more about it – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Course_of_Empire_(paintings)
I had previously done a poem based on Cole’s The Voyage of Life (which you can read here – https://hawthornepassage.wordpress.com/2019/01/13/thomas-coles-the-voyage-of-life/) and on finding The Course of Empire wanted to do something similar again. I also found a wonderfully written poem on Destruction by Cathartic Tendencies which I recommend you to read here – Degraded Humility
