art, death, Ekphrasis, War

The Apotheosis of War | Poetry | Spillwords

Leah Chrestien
The Apotheosis of War, painted by Vasily Vasilyevich Vereshchagin

My poem has been accepted at Spillwords. 

A pile of human skulls –
tossed into the lonesome wild;
aesthetically unpleasing,
unorthodox to the common eye,
the aftermath of each destructive war
claiming millions of human lives.

Skulls of the same size –
inseparable from one another;
with hollow eyes, empty jaws,
yellow tints and bleached surfaces
are dumped into a no man’s land
and left to rot in the sallow sand.

The pile of skulls keeps rising;
friend and foe decompose together
abandoned by their respective sides;
how insignificant must be their deaths
in the grander scheme of things
to the corrupt politicians and evil kings.

The skulls they disintegrate –
while living, they were irrelevant,
their premature deaths are insignificant,
much too commonplace to be honored,
and way too many to be remembered.

There is no more land for burials,
too many young lives are at disposal,
no priests available for religious rituals,
yet, the dark blood flow is continual.

A disturbing pile of skulls
is a signature of cruel conquerors,
the lasting legacy of bloody emperors.

On death, the skulls are abandoned;
on death, they look the same –

disposable pawns of a dirty game.

Click here to view the poem.

Unknown's avatar

Published by Leah Chrestien

I'm a data scientist currently working for IDC and living in Prague. In my free time, I enjoy travelling, photography, hiking, theatre and literature.

13 thoughts on “The Apotheosis of War | Poetry | Spillwords”

    1. Yes, David. It is devastating to read about what happened in Cambodia. People from so many lands and cultures can resonate with this picture which makes it so powerful. Thank you for your kind words.

      Like

      Reply

Leave a comment