We
set up laws
to
obey the king upon the throne
and
to turn the country into home,
a
place where people would greet
each other passing on the street,
not kill each other over scraps of meat.
But
laws did not suffice.
For
such is mankind’s vice:
we
ignore the law, respect the price
of
the devilish things that do entice
our
monstrous greed to play at dice
with
children’s lives
and
ancient forest woodland,
the ocean tides,
the
dying crops on the drying land.
Laws
would not have slowed the fire
that
every soul does char and burn
if
the king had not in turn
revealed
in tales a land of fire
reserved
for murderers, thieves and liars.
Hell
is the ultimate prison, ultimate end,
the
king would say,
and
death is here eagerly willing to send
the
disobedient to torments vile and eternal,
to
die endlessly in suffering infernal.
Still
the threat of hell has failed to stop
those
greedy few who laugh and mock
the
hellish stories as children’s stock,
those
bloated beasts with hearts of rock,
who
chew upon the people’s bones
and
sit atop the world’s gold thrones.
