Fear and Fury

My hairy knuckles bristled;
Fear or fury, no difference,
Flaked flint edges and an end promised;
Paint it in an unlit cave!
Not Lascaux or Cueva de La Pasiega,
But someplace that death may die,
Sure as fear or fury.

I trembled in a mountain pass,
Urine hot against my thighs;
Make it Thermopylae, if you will,
Or a man astride an elephant in the Alps,
Stamping mirrored echoes through the Earth
Down into the cradle of the Po;
Fall upon the triarii as the Republic falls,
SPQR in an ancient death ledger,
And I will surely die of insanity,
Armed by fear or fury.

Assemble your hosts upon the
Campus Martius or the
Champ de Mars or the
Marsovo Polye;
Play bugles, play fifes, play drums;
Hear hoarse screams and death rattles;
Wonder if death can die
Before fear or fury.