Sonnet XIII

The time of eagles has passed from the land

Its echoes fading off the shattered cliffs

Nostalgic mourners strain to catch the whiffs

Of incense long burned out beneath the sand

They miss their carven lord who used to mock

His tiny priests with dark and lordly eye

They supplicate his wings to catch the sky

And bring back ordered life from sculptured rock

But winds have beaten down the cruel stones

And only memory makes them royal bones

And lesser birds now touch the richer clouds

Where kings once rode the wind are now free crowds

The Golden Age of eagles just the last

With virtue traced to being in the past

Christopher J. Cramer

October 2, 1983