The Templar King

© Robert William Shmigelsky

To the king of the templar knights of old

the light bestowed a looped cross

to hang around his neck.

From this cross, the templar king and his knights,

learned to draw and bend time with a sword.

Helmets crowned and shields kited,

the templars knights ruled the temporal lights.

Templar knights, preoccupied in practice,

slowed and sped time around them.

Others attempted to look into the future

to prepare for what was coming

or peer into the past to look for clues,

but only catching faint sounds or flashes,

time being a yarn of ravel.

As for the templar king, King Ither the first,

he halted time around him to keep himself young,

the wrinkles and gray hairs away.

The templar king and his templar knights

spent so much time in past and future

that they spent not enough time in the present.

In a thousand years' time, from time not spent

dealing with present matters

relations between the king's four cousins -

the kings of sages, rangers, dragoons,

those ordinary not given a gift of their own -

gradually rotted like an uneaten apple.

Darkness arrived in their kingdom

and shadowed their castles, mansions,

towers, halls, and arks. Its arrival

unforeseen, there was no time

for the templar king to halt or slow it down,

nor could he go back in time

and fix the mistakes he had made in the past,

time being a yarn of ravel.

The five lineages were forced to leave

Palador, the first kingdom of men.

With those that remained to be present,

trapped like the inside of a hourglass,

the templar king and his knights were the last to flee.

With winter putting on the sleeve of her coat,

the grains pouring down through the hole,

the king asked himself: "where should we go?"

The sea, now frigid with waters icy cold,

offered no escape, their silver ships sunk

to the bottom of the Endless Sea.

Their only hope lay to the south

in finding a way through, as was said,

the impassable White Mountains

blocking the lands beyond.

Moments in time, of the love he had lost,

glistening in his eyes, the templar king

led his knights and the last of his people–

the descendants of his original entourage

he had inspired to become great artisans–

to the said impassable White Mountains.

They skimmed the mountains, looking for way out.

But as was said--the mountains were impassable.

Just then darkness, wielding time's end,

caught up with them, their ragtag host.

The templar king did not need to see ahead

to know what darkness had planned.

Before a moment had time to pass,

Ither threw down his shield,

and clenched the looped cross around his neck.

He strode up to the nearest peak,

gripped the golden hilt tucked in at his side

and unleashed a long glimmer of light.

He slammed the crystal blade of his sword

into the hard mountain rock.

The temporal lights played around the templar king,

shining brightly off his golden plate armor.

Draining all the time poured into the cross,

a thousand years passed for the king

as the temporal winds bought forth

great flurries of icy cold rains and winds

up against the impassable White Mountains,

grinding granite rock to pebble and dust.

Time spent, the temporal winds ended.

Old and gray, the templar king collapsed

before the newly weathered mountain pass.

What had eluded others for so many years

appeared before him the very next moment:

As the last of his people descended down

to a quaint little land between valley slopes,

the last of his knights turned around,

pointed their swords at the host behind them.

The temporal lights played abreast their crystal blades

then lanced out and struck Palador,

freezing that kingdom in that moment of time.

Future secure, the life of templar king ended,

secure in the arms of his daughter, Adrianna,

who herself had looked older than her father

only a matter of moments ago.

_________________

While new, I am a serious fantasy writer working part time as a care aide to support my writing.  My first paid publication credits will be the poem "Ordinary" in the upcoming Spring 2010 issues of  Sorcerous Signals and Mystic Signals and the poems "Song of the Lamia," "Obsidian," "Conjured Food: a Herald's Commercial," and "Ring" in an upcoming print edition of Abandoned Towers.