Oracle
What bitter celebration
to survey your fallen empire
The glory of your conquests
and excesses of her decadence
To pray at its ruined temples
and remember the march
of her armies, under ragged
banners and burning sun
The madness of its tyrants,
the melancholy of her poets
To hum her hymns and
whisper its anthem
along its cobbled streets,
between her broken columns
A city that never dies
but whose memories are destined
to be swallowed whole
by the vestal earth
beneath my feet.
Copyright © 2019 Bogdan Ciochinaru