In the gyre vaunted of the Last Gohlguanarchy:
Eighteen thousand watch a stark dorsal cross rise
In the sky behind the toxic brim of Jirreshnag's moon
Fallen in dim eclipse, air shorn of disastrous twilight.
The sole ruined shareholder of an isolate empire
Sends them forth into serried ranks of horizontal mist.
Their passage through air begins with a pair of hours
When the broad sun new-risen weighs heavily between
Two slaves.
The second one in the light of a double-edged threat
Cuts and binds brass and stone to blunt the lion's paws.
Against the wreckful siege of battering days,
Nagarjuna's gates of steel in rocks impregnable
Are no stronger than summer's honey breath.
