Your death-strewn pilgrimage is ended when
You see my arm uplifted. On my loam
You are a kingly commoner; all men
Are peers. No feudal lord, here, has a place.
There is an alchemy within my farms,
My shops and temples, that will leave no trace
Of hunger-specters--or of war-alarms.
With eagle-pinioned valor keep my hearth
A citadel for true democracy--
The chrism of whose love will heal the earth
And planet-far erect an Empery
Of Peace. So bid me live and wave unfurled,
My Glorious Banner over all the world.
Poet's Reed
Sonnet Sequence, First in Democracy Contest
