Solo

Solo.

You cannot hear me now. My voice is lost
in thunder. The song of me is drowned
in war's great symphony like the sound
of violins all beaten flat and tossed
against a cliff of brass. I am not free,
but I am singing still beneath the clash,
below the metal chorus and the lash
of trumpets at the sky. Long will I be
but a tiny voice, crying in the dawn
of stars to dream at and a world beyond,
and hold my keening note until the wand
waves back the brasses and the drums are gone,
then brave against the stillness sing my part,
the deathlessness of beauty in the heart.