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I'm only a few sessions into running book one but I wanted to start to introduce the Poisoned Pen. What better way than to have his first poem be his namesake?!
Let me know what you think of these and please add some of yours. I am not the world's greatest poet so keep that in mind. Thoughts and feedback welcome.
The Poisoned Pen
A twist of the tip by candle light
Firm grip, knuckles tight
Slowly the pulp rips, starting to fight
This, my poisoned pen
Iron fluid drowns the page
Fears abound 'n rattled cage
Easing words then formed to rage
This, my poisoned pen
Stop the thought!
But the ink still bleeds
Stop the thought!
But the page still feeds
Burn the thoughts to turn them numb
But iron ink stains the shaking thumb
This, a sign of what's to come
This, my poisoned pen.
A Second Tide Rose
Red cast upon a shimmering side.
And those jagged knives
Those jagged knives break the tide
"Stand Firm." said those who Chose.
She'll see our claim yet grows.
Blackened boots from a golden throne
In fear, aggressively cast upon silver stone.
Red come the cries
and these Echoes slowly rise
Red cast upon a simmering side.
And those hidden knives
Those hidden knives break the tide
"Stand Firm." said the Rose.
She'll see our claim yet grows.
Here's some actual poems to use or to adapt:
Ha Jin, "Because I Will be Silenced" from Between Silences. Copyright © 1990 by Ha Jin.
Because I Will be Silenced
Once I have the freedom to say
my tongue will lose its power.
Since my poems strive to break the walls
that cut off people’s voices,
they become drills and hammers.
But I will be silenced.
The starred tie around my neck
at any moment can tighten into a cobra.
How can I speak about coffee and flowers?
Craft [The first great poet]
BY QUAN BARRY
The first great poet of
the crisis the one whose
generation was left as if
firebombed though if
you look back at the
seminal work you will
see that only a handful of
of the poems explicitly
touch on that dark time
the blood filling with
virulence and the night
always black and
spangled with stars says
when faced with
difficult material the
poet should begin
obliquely creeping in
from the edge a square
of light moving
imperceptibly across the
floor as the earth turns
and so I will tell you
that ever since I saw the
footage of the
journalists hiding in the
attic the rope ladder
pulled up after them
only the one with
foreign papers left to
stand her ground down
below the journalist at
first calmly sitting on
the couch but then
huddling in a cabinet as
the soldiers enter the
apartment next door,
the cries of the mother
floating through the
wall ib’ni ib’ni the
language ancient like
something whetted on
stone the way I image
language would have
sounded in the broken
mouth of King David
Absalom Absalom the
man-child hanging by
the shining black noose
of his own hair in the
fragrant woods of
Ephraim ib’ni ib’ni
next door the sound of
a body being dragged
from the apartment as
his mother wails
into the dark how
many mothers and how
many sons dragged out
into a night spangled
with stars where
everything is a metaphor
for virulence my son
my son and ever since I
saw a clip of the footage
the foreign journalist
managed to smuggle out
of the country images of
the journalist herself
hiding in a space meant
for buckets and rags as
next door the soldiers
drag away a young boy
please hear it again a
child of no more than
twelve his mother’s
lamentations forever
seared in the blood of
this thing I call my life
but really what is it
what is this light I hold
so dear it wants to move
imperceptibly across the
floor as the earth turns
so as not to become
too aware of itself?
Quan Barry, "craft [The first great poet]" from loose strife. Copyright © 2015 by Quan Barry. All rights are controlled by the University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, PA 15260.
Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings [altered to fit the HR campaign]
BY JOY HARJO
I am the holy being of my mother's prayer and my father's song
—Norman Patrick Brown, Poet and Speaker
1. SET CONFLICT RESOLUTION GROUND RULES:
Recognize whose lands these are on which we stand.
Ask the deer, turtle, and the crane.
Make sure the spirits of these lands are respected and treated with goodwill.
The land is a being who remembers everything.
You will have to answer to your children, and their children, and theirs—
The red shimmer of remembering will compel you up the night to walk the perimeter of truth for understanding.
As I brushed my hair over the hotel sink to get ready I heard:
By listening we will understand who we are in this holy realm of words.
Do not parade, pleased with yourself.
You must speak in the language of justice.
2. USE EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION SKILLS THAT DISPLAY AND ENHANCE MUTUAL TRUST AND RESPECT:
If you sign this paper we will become brothers. We will no longer fight. We will give you this land and these waters "as long as the grass shall grow and the rivers run."
The lands and waters they gave us did not belong to them to give. Under false pretenses we signed. After drugging by drink, we signed. With a mass of gunpower pointed at us, we signed. With a flotilla of war ships at our shores, we signed. We are still signing. We have found no peace in this act of signing.
A casino was raised up over the gravesite of our ancestors. Our own distant cousins pulled up the bones of grandparents, parents, and grandchildren from their last sleeping place. They had forgotten how to be human beings. Restless winds emerged from the earth when the graves were open and the winds went looking for justice.
If you raise this white flag of peace, we will honor it.
At Nisroch Bay several hundred women, children, and men were slaughtered in an unspeakable massacre, after a white flag was raised. The Queen's soldiers trampled the white flag in the blood of the peacemakers.
There is a suicide epidemic among native children. It is triple the rate of the rest of Cheliax. "It feels like wartime," said a child welfare cleric in Old Kintargo.
If you send your children to our schools we will train them to get along in this changing world. We will educate them.
We had no choice. They took our children. Some ran away and froze to death. If they were found they were dragged back to the school and punished. They cut their hair, took away their language, until they became as strangers to themselves even as they became strangers to us.
If you sign this paper we will become brothers. We will no longer fight. We will give you this land and these waters in exchange "as long as the grass shall grow and the rivers run."
Put your hand on this codex, this blade, this pen, this quarry, this gun and you will gain trust and respect with us. Now we can speak together as one.
We say, put down your papers, your tools of coercion, your false promises, your posture of superiority and sit with us before the fire. We will share food, songs, and stories. We will gather beneath starlight and dance, and rise together at sunrise.
The sun rose over the Lake of Sorrow this morning, over the city surrounding the white house.
It blazed scarlet, a fire opening truth.
Egorian, or Chogo Hvtke, means the house of the peacekeeper, the keepers of justice.
We have crossed this river to speak to the red leader for peace many times
Since these devils first arrived in our territory and made this their place of governance.
These streets are our old trails, curved to fit around trees.
3. GIVE CONSTRUCTIVE FEEDBACK:
4. REDUCE DEFENSIVENESS AND BREAK THE DEFENSIVENESS CHAIN:
I could hear the light beings as they entered every cell. Every cell is a house of the god of light, they said. I could hear the spirits who love us stomp dancing. They were dancing as if they were here, and then another level of here, and then another, until the whole earth and sky was dancing.
We are here dancing, they said. There was no there.
There was no "I" or "you."
There was us; there was "we."
There we were as if we were the music.
You cannot legislate music to lockstep nor can you legislate the spirit of the music to stop at political boundaries—
—Or poetry, or art, or anything that is of value or matters in this world, and the next worlds.
This is about getting to know each other.
We will wind up back at the blues standing on the edge of the flatted fifth about to jump into a fierce understanding together.
5. ELIMINATE NEGATIVE ATTITUDES DURING CONFLICT:
A panther poised in the cypress tree about to jump is a panther poised in a cypress tree about to jump.
The panther is a poem of fire green eyes and a heart charged by four winds of four directions.
The panther hears everything in the dark: the unspoken tears of a few dozen human years, storms that will break what has broken his world, a bluebird swaying on a branch a few miles away.
He hears the death song of his approaching prey:
I will always love you, sunrise.
I belong to the black cat with fire green eyes.
There, in the cypress tree near the morning star.
6. AND, USE WHAT YOU LEARN TO RESOLVE YOUR OWN CONFLICTS AND TO MEDIATE OTHERS' CONFLICTS:
When we made it back home, back over those curved roads
that wind through the city of peace, we stopped at the
doorway of dusk as it opened to our homelands.
We gave thanks for the story, for all parts of the story
because it was by the light of those challenges we knew
ourselves—
We asked for forgiveness.
We laid down our burdens next to each other.
Altered from: Joy Harjo, "Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings" from Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings. Copyright © 2015 by Joy Harjo.
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From Shelley's poem, "The Masque of Anarchy" protesting the massacre of 18 pro-democracy and anti-poverty protesters, and the injury of 300 more.
Excerpts, slightly adjusted:
I met Murder on the way—
He had a mask like Castlereagh—
Very smooth he looked, yet grim ;
Seven hell-hounds followed him :
All were fat ; and well they might
Be in admirable plight,
For one by one, and two by two,
He tossed them human hearts to chew
Which from his wide cloak he drew.
Next came Fraud, and he had on,
Like Lord Sarini, an ermined gown ;
His big tears, for he wept well,
Turned to mill-stones as they fell.
And the little children, who
Round his feet played to and fro,
Thinking every tear a gem,
Had their brains knocked out by them.
Clothed with the Codex, as with light,
And the shadows of the night,
Like Nidal, next, Hypocrisy
On a crocodile rode by.
And many more Destructions played
In this ghastly masquerade,
All disguised, even to the eyes,
Like Bishops, lawyers, peers, and spies.
Last came Anarchy : he rode
On a white horse, splashed with blood ;
He was pale even to the lips,
Like Death in the Apocalypse.
And he wore a kingly crown ;
And in his grasp a sceptre shone ;
On his brow this mark I saw—
‘I AM GOD, AND THRUNE, AND LAW!’
With a pace stately and fast,
Over Chelish land he passed,
Trampling to a mire of blood
The adoring multitude.
...
When one fled past, a maniac maid,
And her name was Hope, she said :
But she looked more like Despair,
And she cried out in the air :
‘My father Time is weak and gray
With waiting for a better day ;
See how idiot-like he stands,
Fumbling with his palsied hands!
‘He has had child after child,
And the dust of death is piled
Over every one but me—
Misery, oh, Misery!’
Then she lay down in the street,
Right before the horses feet,
Expecting, with a patient eye,
Murder, Fraud, and Anarchy.
When between her and her foes
A mist, a light, an image rose.
Small at first, and weak, and frail
Like the vapour of a vale :
Till as clouds grow on the blast,
Like tower-crowned giants striding fast,
And glare with lightnings as they fly,
And speak in thunder to the sky.
It grew—a Shape arrayed in mail
Brighter than the viper’s scale,
And upborne on wings whose grain
Was as the light of sunny rain.
...
With step as soft as wind it passed
O’er the heads of men—so fast
That they knew the presence there,
And looked,—but all was empty air.
As flowers beneath May’s footstep waken,
As stars from Night’s loose hair are shaken,
As waves arise when loud winds call,
Thoughts sprung where’er that step did fall.
And the prostrate multitude
Looked—and ankle-deep in blood,
Hope, that maiden most serene,
Was walking with a quiet mien :
And Anarchy, the ghastly birth,
Lay dead earth upon the earth ;
The Horse of Death tameless as wind
Fled, and with his hoofs did grind
To dust the murderers thronged behind.
A rushing light of clouds and splendour,
A sense awakening and yet tender
Was heard and felt—and at its close
These words of joy and fear arose
As if their own indignant Earth
Which gave the sons of Chelish birth
Had felt their blood upon her brow,
And shuddering with a mother’s throe
Had turned every drop of blood
By which her face had been bedewed
To an accent unwithstood,—
As if her heart cried out aloud :
‘Silver Ravens, heirs of Glory,
Heroes of unwritten story,
Nurslings of one mighty Mother,
Hopes of her, and one another ;
‘Rise like Lions after slumber
In unvanquishable number.
Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you—
Ye are many—they are few.
‘What is Freedom?—ye can tell
That which slavery is, too well—
For its very name has grown
To an echo of your own.
‘’Tis to work and have such pay
As just keeps life from day to day
In your limbs, as in a cell
For the tyrants’ use to dwell,
‘So that ye for them are made
Loom, and plough, and sword, and spade,
With or without your own will bent
To their defense and nourishment.
‘’Tis to see your children weak
With their mothers pine and peak,
When the winter winds are bleak,—
They are dying whilst I speak.
‘’Tis to hunger for such diet
As the rich man in his riot
Casts to the fat dogs that lie
Surfeiting beneath his eye ;
‘’Tis to let the Ghost of Gold
Take from Toil a thousandfold
More than e’er its substance could
In the tyrannies of old.
...
‘Birds find rest, in narrow nest
When weary of their wingèd quest ;
Beasts find fare, in woody lair
When storm and snow are in the air.
‘Horses, oxen, have a home,
When from daily toil they come ;
Household dogs, when the wind roars,
Find a home within warm doors.’
‘Asses, swine, have litter spread
And with fitting food are fed ;
All things have a home but one—
Thou, Oh, Englishman, hast none !
‘This is Slavery—savage men,
Or wild beasts within a den
Would endure not as ye do—
But such ills they never knew.
‘What art thou, Freedom ? O ! could slaves
Answer from their living graves
This demand—tyrants would flee
Like a dream’s imagery
‘Thou are not, as impostors say,
A shadow soon to pass away,
A superstition, and a name
Echoing from the cave of Fame.
‘For the labourer thou art bread,
And a comely table spread
From his daily labour come
In a neat and happy home.
‘Thou art clothes, and fire, and food
For the trampled multitude—
No—in countries that are free
Such starvation cannot be
As in Kin-land now we see.
‘To the rich thou art a check,
When his foot is on the neck
Of his victim, thou dost make
That he treads upon a snake.
‘Thou art Justice—ne’er for gold
May thy righteous laws be sold
As laws are in Targo-land—thou
Shield’st alike both high and low.
‘Thou art Wisdom—Freemen never
Dream that Gods will damn for ever
All who think those things untrue
Of which Priests make such ado.
‘Thou art Peace—never by thee
Would blood and treasure wasted be
As tyrants wasted them, when all
Leagued to quench thy flame in Gaul.
‘What if Chelish toil and blood
Was poured forth, even as a flood ?
It availed, Oh, Liberty.
To dim, but not extinguish thee.
‘Thou art Love—the rich have kissed
Thy feet, and like him following bliss,
Give their substance to the free
And through the rough world follow thee,
‘Or turn their wealth to arms, and make
War for thy belovèd sake
On wealth, and war, and fraud—whence they
Drew the power which is their prey.
‘Science, Poetry, and Thought
Are thy lamps ; they make the lot
Of the dwellers in a cot
So serene, they curse it not.
‘Spirit, Patience, Gentleness,
All that can adorn and bless
Art thou—let deeds, not words, express
Thine exceeding loveliness.
‘Let a great Assembly be
Of the fearless and the free
On some spot of Chelish ground
Where the plains stretch wide around.
‘Let the blue sky overhead,
The green earth on which ye tread,
All that must eternal be
Witness the solemnity.
‘From the corners uttermost
Of the bounds of Chelish coast ;
From every hut, village, and town
Where those who live and suffer moan
For others’ misery or their own,
‘From the workhouse and the prison
Where pale as corpses newly risen,
Women, children, young and old
Groan for pain, and weep for cold—
‘From the haunts of daily life
Where is waged the daily strife
With common wants and common cares
Which sows the human heart with tares—
‘Lastly from the palaces
Where the murmur of distress
Echoes, like the distant sound
Of a wind alive around
‘Those prison halls of wealth and fashion.
Where some few feel such compassion
For those who groan, and toil, and wail
As must make their brethren pale—
‘Ye who suffer woes untold,
Or to feel, or to behold
Your lost country bought and sold
With a price of blood and soul—
‘Let a vast assembly be,
And with great solemnity
Declare with measured words that ye
Are, as God has made ye, free—
‘Be your strong and simple words
Keen to wound as sharpened swords,
And wide as targets let them be,
With their shade to cover ye.
‘Let the tyrants pour around
With a quick and startling sound,
Like the loosening of a sea,
Troops of armed emblazonry.
‘Let the charged cavalry drive
Till the dead air seems alive
With the clash of clanging wheels,
And the tramp of horses’ heels.
‘Let the fixèd bayonet
Gleam with sharp desire to wet
Its bright point in Chelish blood
Looking keen as one for food.
‘Let the horsemen’s scimitars
Wheel and flash, like sphereless stars
Thirsting to eclipse their burning
In a sea of death and mourning.
‘Stand ye calm and resolute,
Like a forest close and mute,
With folded arms and looks which are
Weapons of unvanquished war,
‘And let Panic, who outspeeds
The career of armèd steeds
Pass, a disregarded shade
Through your phalanx undismayed.
‘Let the laws of your own land,
Good or ill, between ye stand
Hand to hand, and foot to foot,
Arbiters of the dispute,
‘The old laws of Aroden—they
Whose reverend heads with age are gray,
Children of a wiser day ;
And whose solemn voice must be
Thine own echo—Liberty !
‘On those who first should violate
Such sacred heralds in their state
Rest the blood that must ensue,
And it will not rest on you.
‘And if then the tyrants dare
Let them ride among you there,
Slash, and stab, and maim, and hew, —
What they like, that let them do.
‘With folded arms and steady eyes,
And little fear, and less surprise,
Look upon them as they slay
Till their rage has died away.’
‘Then they will return with shame
To the place from which they came,
And the blood thus shed will speak
In hot blushes on their cheek.
‘Every woman in the land
Will point at them as they stand—
They will hardly dare to greet
Their acquaintance in the street.
‘And the bold, true warriors
Who have hugged Danger in wars
Will turn to those who would be free,
Ashamed of such base company.
‘And that slaughter to the Nation
Shall steam up like inspiration,
Eloquent, oracular ;
A volcano heard afar.
‘And these words shall then become
Like Oppression’s thundered doom
Ringing through each heart and brain.
Heard again—again—again—
‘Rise like Lions after slumber
In unvanquishable number—
Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you—
Ye are many—they are few.’
Adapting another one of Shelley, Men of England
Men of Kintargo, wherefore plough
For the lords who lay ye low?
Wherefore weave with toil and care
The rich robes your tyrants wear?
Wherefore feed and clothe and save
From the cradle to the grave
Those ungrateful drones who would
Drain your sweat—nay, drink your blood?
Wherefore, Bees of Kintargo, forge
Many a weapon, chain, and scourge,
That these stingless drones may spoil
The forced produce of your toil?
Have ye leisure, comfort, calm,
Shelter, food, love’s gentle balm?
Or what is it ye buy so dear
With your pain and with your fear?
The seed ye sow, another reaps;
The wealth ye find, another keeps;
The robes ye weave, another wears;
The arms ye forge, another bears.
Sow seed—but let no tyrant reap:
Find wealth—let no imposter heap:
Weave robes—let not the idle wear:
Forge arms—in your defense to bear.
Shrink to your cellars, holes, and cells—
In hall ye deck another dwells.
Why shake the chains ye wrought? Ye see
The steel ye tempered glance on ye.
With plough and spade and hoe and loom
Trace your grave and build your tomb
And weave your winding-sheet—till fair
Kintargo be your Sepulchre.
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Adapting Whitman...
To a Foil'd Silver Raven
COURAGE yet, my brother or my sister!
Keep on—Liberty is to be subserv'd whatever occurs;
That is nothing that is quell'd by one or two failures, or any num-
ber of failures,
Or by the indifference or ingratitude of the people, or by any
unfaithfulness,
Or the show of the courts of power, soldiers, cannon, penal statutes.
What we believe in waits latent forever through all the land,
Invites no one, promises nothing, sits in calmness and light, is
positive and composed, knows no discouragement,
Waiting patiently, waiting its time.
(Not songs of loyalty alone are these,
But songs of insurrection also,
For I am the sworn poet of every dauntless rebel the world over,
And he going with me leaves peace and routine behind him,
And stakes his life to be lost at any moment.)
The battle rages with many a loud alarm and frequent advance
and retreat,
The Infernal triumphs, or supposes he triumphs,
The prison, scaffold, garroté, handcuffs, iron necklace and lead-
balls do their work,
The named and redacted heroes pass to other spheres,
The great speakers and writers are exiled, they lie sick in distant
lands,
The cause is asleep, the strongest throats are choked with their
own blood,
The young men droop their eyelashes toward the ground when
they meet;
But for all this Liberty has not gone out of the place, nor the
infidel enter'd into full possession.
When liberty goes out of a place it is not the first to go, nor the
second or third to go,
It waits for all the rest to go, it is the last.
When there are no more memories of heroes and martyrs,
And when all life and all the souls of men and women are dis-
charged from any part of the earth,
Then only shall liberty or the idea of liberty be discharged from
that part of the earth,
And the Infernal come into full possession.
Then courage Silver Raven revolter, revoltress!
For till all ceases neither must you cease.
I do not know what you are for, (I do not know what I am for
myself, nor what any thing is for,)
But I will search carefully for it even in being foil'd,
In defeat, poverty, misconception, imprisonment—for they too
are great.
Did we think victory great?
So it is—but now it seems to me, when it cannot be help'd, that
defeat is great,
And that death and dismay are great.
I think my players would call me out if I presented them poems they recognized. ;)
Best to get creative and have fun doing it ya know?
Google works for everyone.
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They'll recognize Joy Harjo, Han Jin, and Quan Berry? Okay. I'm assuming other tables won't have poetry majors. Lord knows, I'd never read those, and I took a ton of English classes in undergrad and was a college professor. Yeah, I added in some classics. So sue me.
Also, it took quite a bit of time to read through a bunch of poetry online to select ones that fit this campaign, filtering out the ones with inappropriate themes and cultural references. About an hour, in fact. It was hardly a "quick Google". I'm not too happy with your flippant response. Heck if I'm going to provide "thoughts and feedback."
It wasn't meant to be flippant, so my apologies for it coming off that way.
I know that having a compilation of poetry is a great thing and I may try to sneak a few of these in my campaign!
My flippant comment was meant as more of a commentary directed towards the cynics at my table than it was meant to discredit your work. :p
Sorry it came off that way
Perhaps I was terse because of the lack of feedback and the use of the words "Here are some actual poems."
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I'm pretty sure I've posted this before in other places, but as long as we're invoking real-world poetry, and with due apologies to Phil and Sonny, I can't help but put this in the mouth of Hei-Fen in the aftermath of Manticce's soiree:
Their khaki coats are hung in the closet near the fur
Asking handouts from the ladies while they criticize the lords
Boasting of the murder of the very hands that pour
And the victims learn to giggle for at least they are not bored
And my shoulders had to shrug as I crawled beneath the rug
And retuned my piano.
The hostess is enormous, she fills the room with perfume
Meets the guests and smothers them with greeting
And she asks "how are you" as she offers them a drink
The countess of the social grace who never seems to blink
And she promises to take to you if you promise not to think
And my shoulders had to shrug as I crawled beneath the rug
And retuned my piano.
The beauty of the hour is blazing in the present
She surrounds herself with those who would surrender
Floating in her flattery she's a trophy prize caressed
Protected by a pretty face, sometimes cursed and sometimes blessed
And she's staring down their desires as they're staring down her dress
And my shoulders had to shrug as I crawled beneath the rug
And retuned my piano.
The egos shine like lightbulbs, so bright you cannot see them
Blind each other blinder than a sand box
All the fury of an argument is holding back their yawns
A challenge shakes the chandelier, the selfish swords are drawn
To the loser go the hangups, to the victor the hangers-on
And my shoulders had to shrug as I crawled beneath the rug
And retuned my piano.
They travel to the table, the host is served for supper
And they pass each other down for salt and pepper
And the conversation sparkles as their wits are dipped in wine
Dinosaurs on a diet, on each other they will dine
And they pick their teeth and the squelch a belch saying
"Darling you tasted divine"
And my shoulders had to shrug as I crawled beneath the rug
And retuned my piano.
The wallflower is waiting, she hides behind composure
She'd love to dance and prays that no one asks her
And she steals a glance at lovers as her fingers tease her hair
And she marvels at the confidence of those who hide their fears
Then her eyes are closed as she rides away with a foreign legionnaire
And my shoulders had to shrug as I crawled beneath the rug
And retuned my piano.
Romeo is reeling, counting notches on his thigh-bone
Searching for one hundred and eleven
And he's charming as a cherub as he leads them to his web
Seducing queens and gypsy girls in the boudoir of his head
And he wraps himself in a tablecloth and pretends he is a bed
And my shoulders had to shrug as I crawled beneath the rug
And retuned my piano.
The party must be over, even the losers are leaving
But just one doubt is nagging at my caustic mind
So I snuck up close behind me, and I gave myself a kiss
I led myself to the mirror to expose what I have missed
There I saw a laughing maniac who was writing songs like this
And my shoulders had to shrug as I crawled beneath the rug
And retuned my piano.
So my party just liberated Marquel and they still don’t know who the Poison Pen is, which I find appropriate. At first, I thought he would stop writing after his poems were outlawed and he was liberated, but that’s not very Poison Pen-y. So what better way to drop a solid nod to the PCs actions than honor them with a poem detailing their actions?!
I’m excited for them to put it together and if this poem doesn’t do it, then surely future poems might!
Silver Splinters
Shackled by lathed oak, heated sand, and silver speckled stone.
Clutching the most potent of weapons, fighting winter’s moan.
My curtain drew’n fell upon this lonely isolation.
Then, forcibly, the darkness split, spelling it’s own ruination.
This shade I witnessed, amid the shadow,
Stripped the fibers from the moon.
And her Silver Splinters shred the gathering gloom.
As if at once the shade amid the shadow cast,
A harbinger of abolition and proof the night’ll ne’er last.
Its spawn swam and leapt among the haze,
talons gripping hope of better days.
This shade I witnessed, amid the shadow,
Stripped the fibers from the moon.
And her Silver Splinters shred the glass prison room.
To that cell she deemed we are not to be confined.
Not their purpose: never. Another fate resigned.
Yet if night’s calm bastard child, even for a moment, is ever to subside.
If by Burning Mother’s tender caress, or her Shadow patron’s pride,
Under awnings and alleyways, she dances- rest assured.
Waiting her next moment to see our hopes ensured.
This shade we witness, amid the shadow,
Will strip the fibers from the moon.
And her Silver Splinters will rend the oppressive locks of Thrune.