Sermons of Fire and Light: Seven Ballads from the Eternal Word
Ballad I: Love Forgotten
The keeper stood high on the wall with his lamp burning cold in the dark.
His eyes were like flint in the wind, and his hands were unyielding and stark.
He watched through the long-blooded dusk for the wolves that would creep through the gate,
But none passed unnoticed, unchallenged, unseen, whether early or late.
The scrolls in his chambers were sacred and sealed by the fire of the law.
He spoke with the voice of the mountain and bore both its wisdom and scars.
Yet under the shell of his armour, an ember began to decline,
The song that had summoned him upward was fading and slipping in rhyme.
He knew every word of the creed as he sang it out loud in the storms,
But he’d long since forgotten the love that had moulded his faith in its form.
The hope that had leapt in his breast like a stag on the hills of the earth,
Now sputtered like coals in the wind and the rain that no longer had worth.
But then came a voice on the wind like the cry of a long-buried spring:
“You’ve stood and you’ve fought, but forgotten the love that first taught you to sing.
Return to the place where your heart was still humble, where mercy ran wild.
Remember the wounds that once healed you, return dearest wandering child.”
The lamp that you hold with such honour shall vanish along with your name.
For what is your wall without mercy and what is your gate without grace?
The truth must be wed to the Lover whose blood brought the light to your place.”
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