Wall of Sand

by John Williams

This poem was inspired by the battle of Marathon where the Persian army, who outnumbered the Greeks, invaded. The Greek army succeed at Marathon, and it took roughly another ten years until the Persian’s attempted another full-scale invasion.

The perspective of the poem is in the first-person and I was intrigued by what the soldiers would have experienced being faced with such a formidable army that the Persian’s possessed. As with most of history the reality of this lived experience is lost to time.

Wall of Sand

We offered sacrifice to gods at night
We offered dust and sand and salt to burn,
From the dust, we came, we vow, return.
For this daylight that our descendants see,
To the simple life that they will keep.

Now I gaze across the vastest beach
Where the East have come to consume its West.
From invisible lines we walk and meet.
It drums my chest,
it numbs the rest.

They blot the horizon, in lines of ships
Their great war galleons poised.
They are different from us stood on this land
They bring swarms of swords,
As we line in rank.

The many are one from the distance,
Dark armoured ants they grow,
From their marching archers forming,
Raining arrows, faint whirring—heavy blows.

Our feet sink to the sand
The signal sounds, then the journey.
These Footprints extinguish in marching.
And shed weight of worry to the wind.

Battle cries scream and wane
Eaten away by shield and spear,

Our rules make men from this melee,
As this melee takes reason from the soul.
Now no matter the force of the world against your shield,
Only your orders you will follow.

Keep your left arm high.
Move forward.

Do this until drumming is all that exists,
Do this until all is nothing but will,
Do this for the man at your side,
Do this until night is clear as day,
Because our flesh is the wall of the Athenian gate.