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((Old hands on the server may already be familiar with these. They were posted in bits and pieces on the old forums many years ago; I recently cleaned them up and arranged them with annotations for the "Artist's Corner" on Homeland's website. Since Arjah is still around and still makes occasional references to her career as a poet, I thought I would post them here as well. Enjoy!))

--

To My Homeland -

I believe this handsome volume is now out of print, and the works within it are several years old at least. Still, it gives me pleasure to leaf through it from time to time, and I hope that others of Homeland may find a similar enjoyment from my early efforts.

The verses were all written long before I took it into my head to found Homeland; most date from either my first tenure with the Modas il Toralar or my time as "Professora of Sorcery and Etiquette" at Da Doctas School of Medicine.

The annotations in this edition were added shortly after Homeland's founding, and are the only commercial writing I have published during our movement's time.
- A

Sonnets - To Those I Have Loved


To Vashia, the Forgotten
Oh, that I could have met you in the spring!
When all is young and heedless of the days,
And Time withholds his hand from every thing;
Leaves lovers free to love as lovers may.
But we were giv'n to meet in passing fall,
When beauty of brevity is born,
And fairness only heralds Death's sad call,
And waits to stand with her cold grace adorn'd.
From you, I learned to love a lover's pain
But not to love the ache of lovers lost!
Oh, Lady, come to teach your friend again,
Who cannot learn alone to love this frost.
All others count you lost to Winter's hate,
But from you learned I only how to wait.

To Grummak, the Greatheart
How strange to see such frailty in form
Long suited to the warlike orcish mien,
And mark the work of Time's contemptuous scorn,
So swift to dim his lustrous honor's sheen!
Great heart, is your chief's battle so swift o'er,
That thou hast laid thy ancient weapons by?
Or at what cost hast thou thy honor low'rd
And sworn no more as loyal Horde to die?
What shame, engendered by a kindly heart!
What weakness born of age and mortal clay -
Your time, dear friend, is run; now take your final part
And let secluded failure close your days.
And yet you fought, and well, thy dream to win:
Some honor there, that treason cannot dim.

To Estaban, Who Has Been Kind
I cannot say how long your frame may last,
Dear friend - poor ris'n 'gain mortal stuff it be,
An' doomed to die a little every day,
Fulfillment of thy mortal destiny.
Yet 'ere this stumbling, earthly course is run
Your loving poet shapes remembrance
And begs you find not o'erly burdensome
Th'eternal mem'ry of her reverence.
Be here enshrined! Forever live in me,
You who were ever kind when need was not.
"Great Generosity" thy mem'ry be;
So let it stand an' all else be forgot.
Rest easily, dear friend, when needs you must;
Your kindness here remains, tho' you be dust.

To Dreejin, Who Mourns
Dear friend, is't sorro'ing thought of lovers gone
That stains thy inner face with unshed tears
Whilst outwardly thou holdst thy count'nance strong,
Or hast thy inner heart some unspoke fear?
I ask but out of love, who hath no pow'r
To heal or to defend, yet gladly would
With impotent compassion ease thy hours
'Til thoughts of mourning sadness turn to good.
Can cheery verse compress thy bleeding heart?
Then let this passing script relieve thy pain,
An' as the herb doth curb the fever's start
Let it kill sorrow ere it start again
Thy poet loves thee, tho' she be not great;
Within her art let pain on pleasure wait.

To Jilanas, Who Is Returned
What fire must burn within my breast for thee!
To warm me in this deary place, as if
The very taproots of the strad'ling tree
That pierce this tomb did burn to light my gift.
Oh, gentle pain, unclasp thy cold embrace
And let him go! For Arjah is thy slave,
And aches with want unbound to take his place,
Who thou would hold delerious 'neath this grave.
Let soothing hands and poems gentler still
Recall thee from our master's wrath, dear friend;
Rise off this slab, reclaim thy battered will,
And serve as Toralar until the end -
Whatever ill our master's rage may do,
Thy sister sworn shall serve to make anew.

To Sadera, Who Is Fairest
How fair thy mortal shape must once have been,
That Death's untimely touch can little do
But grace with more perfection its short dream,
And with her pale beauty it pursue.
Awake, dear sleeping shadow of the night!
Thy poet sings thee from thy mortal rest
To bid thee ope' thy frame unto her sight,
And hers thy timeless beauty press against.
Oh, that I could in words an altar build!
And lay myself upon it to be thine;
To wait, thy holy chalice, to be filled
By all the grace that through thy death still shines.
Thy mortal life thou gave to Entropy;
The rest be here enshrined by Poetry.

A.N. - This cycle was the first poetry I wrote directly in the Orcish language, and also the first that I published. It was released in series, alongside other works, and has since been compiled in editions of its own. Some of the names will be well-known to you; others entirely foreign. I will briefly note them all:

Vashia was Headmistress of the Modas il Toralar at the time of my joining them, and my tutor in many ways; the sonnet is as true now as it was then.

My offering to Grummak, regrettably, stemmed from a heated argument between us; I take some comfort in knowing that the mocking nickname I gave him has since become his legacy. His response was a valiant effort at verse from an orc with no talent for it at all, and I still keep a copy in my house.

I very much doubt anyone will remember Estaban now, but at the time of my writing he was a very wealthy gentleman of the Undercity, who gave generously to my dowry on my first engagement.

My husband Dreejin requires little introduction or explanation, if any; we had not even begun to court at the time of this sonnet. I am still fond of it.

Jilanas, also of the Modas il Toralar, never liked my poetry, but it pleased me to include him when he suffered a near-fatal punishment at the hands of Aziel V'Ghera. I think of it now as less of a tribute to the individual, and more to the loyalty I felt to all members of the Modas il Toralar at the time of its writing.

And Sadera di Masoch, like Vashia, remains in my heart now much as she did when this verse was written.

The Toralar's Triumph over Time

Behold the time before time was!
When all was power, or was not,
And nothing lived to be forgot
And all our thoughts were yet unthought,
'Til all that was decided "Thus!"
And life that instant came to be -- this, the Toralar will see.

Behold the time when all are slaves!
All blind, in wretchedness they creep
Where thousands scream and thousands weep
And thousands die and pile deep
Within their overflowing graves
And we who watch are all that's free -- this, the Toralar now see.

Behold the time when He will rise!
As Death, denied her fatal sting
Gives knee before the risen King,
His children rise upon His wings
And stand in hellish paradise
As rulers over all that's been -- this, the Toralar have seen!

A.N. - This, like "Unfurl the Banner of Thy Cause" below, was written as a propaganda piece for the Modas il Toralar. I did a number of works in their name, including several prose pieces and a rather skewed interview with the Circle toward the end of my first tenure there. On the whole they are not bad works, and I do not regret them.

Unfurl the Banner of Thy Cause

Unfurl the banner of thy cause
To fly before the Lord!
And raise in song, you mighty throng
The righteousness of his word!

The sun that every morn' doth thaw
The night's incessant dark
Must hide for shame before the flame
That burns fore'er in His heart.

He comes to write again the laws
That hold in thrall the earth
And make anew the blessed few
That He shall shield from Death.

For Time's unkindly cruel claws
Are pulled, her venom drawn
As He hath sworn to make reborn
All who hath greeted His dawn.

So let all mortal hearts give pause
And gladly stir to sing
From all our hearts unto the vaults
Our praise for He the king.

Now let this song all hearts give awe
And place in hands the sword
Of righteous fire for one desire:
One life, one faith, one Lord!

A.N. - I originally composed a score to accompany this, in the style of the Lordaeron hymnals, but I find it on the whole lacking and unoriginal. I believe copies of the sheet music are still stored in the back room at Salazar's, but there has never been much demand.


A Farewell to Poetry, by a Politician

She cannot feel, who ever thinks too much,
Nor write who in her thinking cannot feel.
Dear Poetry! Still aching for thy touch,
Thy lady begs thee hear her sad appeal:
Mourn not thy erstwhile lover's weeping flight,
Nor seek to woo her coyly back to thee
With reminisces of thy sweet delights-
Be kind, my gentle god, and let me flee!
No honor could I do thee in my state,
Who unkind times hath turned to politic-
I am by my own art made apostate;
Transformed by unjust need to heretic.
My words I'll henceforth bend to policy,
But oh! The longing of my heart for poetry!

A.N. - I have received a few letters complimenting the lengthening device in the last line (where the word "longing" extends the line and the sentiment two syllables beyond the established format), and a great deal more gleefully pointing out my error. My admirers have the right in this instance; the device was deliberate, and I am quite fond of it, as I am of this verse in general.

The Horse, or, A Poet's Caution

A passing fair and pleasing handsome horse
That stopped beside my brook to quench its thirst
Whilst still I sat, a-dreaming verse unpenned,
With aim to write ere up I rose again,
Did catch the fickle eye of Poetry,
Whose never-failing spontaneity
Did move me sharp to make the beast more great
In words than given to its mortal fate --
And oh! Creation of my scribbling pen,
How better than a horse were thou made then!
So great with words I made thy humble frame
That ne'er a horse as thee deserved the name
So well, nor rose so far above its peers --
Possessed as horses are of humble ears
And tail and coat and such that make a steed,
Yet pale beside my careless writing's deed,
That gifted thee with so much more than they --
Than thou were raised, who were a humble dray
Until sweet poems served to make thee more,
And craft of baser clay this thing of lore.

A fearsome strong and unsurpassed horse
Did stop beside my brook to quench its thirst,
A-frighting me from pleasant idleness
With its display of fierce unbridledness
And wild strength beyond the power to tame
Of mortal creatures, born to lesser frames
Than that which 'compassed all that was this beast,
Which, if it rose from out the distant East
Beside the morning sun would shine more bright,
So blazing glorious was its primal might!
Yet how unfounded was my waking start,
For such a horse could be but born of art
And poetry, which answer not to strength
Or rude display, but laugh to hear the thanks
Of we their humble supplicants on earth,
And from these gentle lords was kindly birthed
In me the power to make this god a horse,
And undo swift what was once done in verse,
Reducing by the scribblings of my pen
What was once glorious to clay again.

Whatever's writ can easily be unwrit,
And woe betide the lord that marks not it.


A.N. - If I could have picked any poem to secure my fame (or infamy), it would have been a better one than this, but it remains the most popular of all my verses. It was originally published with an illustration of a rather sickly horse, wearing a battered crown with the words "The Lord A.V.G." stamped on it, but that was at my publisher's insistence, and I feel the satire was clear enough at the time without it. The Lord Aziel V'Ghera of the Modas il Toralar and I had just had a fierce dispute over public policy (which I was always better at), and his rebuke stung me into writing this. I was, unsurprisingly, expelled from the order almost immediately after; to my credit, I never did publish the companion satire "The Hollow Tower."


Sonnet: To My First-Born Son

Thy mother's haste, my first and only child,
Did thou inherit, who could scarcely stay
And grace her with thy charms a little while,
But raced ahead before thy second day.
What comfort then, to ease a mother's grief
Who never came to know her first-born son?
Can passing days persuade her heart to peace,
Or has her mourning sorrow but begun?
A hundred poems I'd write for thee, my boy
If but a one could bring thee back again
As more than loving memories of joy
And gentle longing bound up in a pen.
Farewell, my son, and may this poetry
Some little grace grant thy mortality.


A.N. - This was written on the day of my first child's birth, while I was still bedridden. It requires little explanation.

A Mothers Prayer upon the Battlefield

How soft the night wind comes upon the field!
Whose flesh, now scarred with raisèd earthen weals
Gives soft repose to those who mark it not,
And to a passing poet's mind such thoughts
As mark with reverent solemnity
These cold remainders of mortality
Who from this wand'ring strangers reverence
Take some degree of childish innocence
To grace them in their strange and ceaseless rest
Upon the field; upon sweet Nature's breast.
And how could I, a mother so bereaved
But pause a while upon the field to grieve
Each mother's son, departed now to join
The too-short livèd child of my own loins -
No greater now, these full-grown men than he,
Who went before them to eternity
And with the grace of youth and innocence
Accepted this, his strange deliverance
From all we know as weary, stumbling life
And from the joys these fallen sacrificed.
So with the gentle susurrus now blows
My humble prayer to thee, my Lord, who knows
More of the stuff of mortal passaging
Than I, whose powers of imagining,
Confinèd as they are to page and pen
Can hardly hope to raise to life again
Those called too early to their mortal fate,
But only grace with dignity their state.
And so, my Lord, a mother's sad request:
Be not unkind to this, our children's rest,
But bear them softly in thy fateful hand
As I treat gently with this wounded land.

A.N. - At this stage of my life, I was a politician even in my grief. The "Lord" referenced in the poem was assumed by Aziel V'Ghera to be himself; in my heart of hearts, it was always to the Baron Samedi that this verse was penned. The images are not imaginary; the entire verse was written on an abandoned battlefield, and I believe it to be one of the most sincere and straightforward of my works.


Poem on the Wall of the Orgrimmar Orphanage

What joy you have in life, hold fast,
And make your own with all the strength you may.
For little good will ever last,
And nothing beautiful can cruel Time sway.

Your mother love, your father keep,
And lacking those, hold to your closest friends.
Laugh you often, and often weep,
And thus in fullness live until your end.

The briefest while are children fair,
Who fast outpace graceful nativities,
So count your youthful charm most rare,
And grateful be for your brevity.


A.N. - To the best of my knowledge, this verse is still there. It has always been popular, and I have never known why.

Sonnets - To My Many Loves

I. Within the Sisterhood

Hast gratitude, my first and strangest love?
Hast any fond or smiling memory?
Took any joy in what I taught you of,
Or loved you ever this my poetry?
What strength, to take a woman to thy breast,
And shelter there her trembling poet's tears!
But oh, my love, why failed your strength the test
Of standing 'gainst thy undeserved fears?
And so thou art forever from me fled,
Who once I thought to make forever mine
And taught to warm another woman's bed --
That, then, the legacy of our short time.
My love you had, my bed, my poetry,
But all this lost to headstrong jealousy.

II. Within the Modas il Toralar

And so the one who made me what I am,
Who bound me, beat me, bent me to her will --
She made me blessed, made me forever damned,
And her for this division love I still.
How lived I ever, 'ere you taught me this?
How weak was I to ever have feared pain?
And knowing now of sweet surrender's bliss,
How could I be as once I was again?
But oh, how thy departure struck my heart,
And how much more the pain of thy return,
When I who love you must remain apart
From this the greatest strength I ever learned --
Sweet agony, for such a one to ache,
Who never loved me but for pleasure's sake.

III. Through Diplomacy

And what of thou, my one-time friend in arms?
What is it makes me dress myself for thee
In all my silks and jewels and wom'nly charms,
Who should and has been but my enemy?
Some strange remainder of a sister's love,
A deep and trusting bond unsevered yet
By all the power of my Lord above;
Unshaken by the heavy hand of threat?
And yet, no sister's love could move me thus,
To balance thee against my jealous Lord --
This then a full and loving woman's lust
That lovers loves; adores to be adored.
Our sister's love I trust forever past,
And pray I now that this new bond may last.

IV. Upon Return

Oh thoughtless lover, how could you have known
How, all surrounded by her lovers fair,
The much-sought Arjah mourned herself alone
And ached to tell the which she would not dare?
No fault of thine, this silent reticence
That bound so long within her aching gaze
The fullness of the loving reverence
She only now before thee dares to raise --
But broken be the dams of lovers past,
And out the flood of her affections pour,
That all who hear the raging cataract
Might cry "'Tis Arjah's love concealed no more!"
If I be damned for any lovers sought,
Then let it only be for di Masoch.

A.N. - A second cycle of sonnets, this was written some time after my taste for the form had expired. It was composed at the request of my publisher, in return for the creation of a personal edition of my "Sonnet - To My First-Born Son." The women addressed are, in order: Krerash of the Erinyes Sisterhood, Vashia of the Modas il Toralar, Morisa of the Erinyes Sisterhood, and Sadera of the Modas il Toralar. I stand by my love for all of them, though I wish I could have written them something less trite.

Ode to a Dying Star

How much more fragile than the glazèd pane
(Through which, at invitation entertained
From certain dear and educated friends
That in the varied testings of their lens
Did tap of needs my unbegrudging coin,
I did allow myself to be enjoined
To gaze) did my conceptions prove to be,
Confronted in the rude observr'try
By view of that most gentle, fixèd light
That to my own and unassisted sight
Marks with a bright familiarity
A single point in that celestial sea,
All ringed within their telescopic gaze
With fires more than e'er in heavens blazed
Within the power of poet's eyes to see,
Who praise its solitary dignity
Full ignorant of that ancestral storm
Surrounding this which my dear friends have sworn
Be that same wand'rer of the vaulted night,
Exposèd now by magnifièd sight
As burning with such self-consuming fire
As ever sparked the fragrant phoenix pyre,
The smallest part of which, with careless ease
Cast down to us, becomes what poets see
And mark the fullness of its countenance,
The which they praise for all the steadfastness
The naked eye perceives in witnessing
That captive of the immolating rings
Which we in turn held captive in the frame
We built to cage a single window-pane.

How bright and wild we ever find our dreams,
Yet from afar, how fixèd must they seem!


A.N. - For a time in the middle of my career I greatly enjoyed the easy pace of heroic couplets, and a brief visit to the observatory in Ratchet one clear night spawned this quick work. It is enjoyably flowery, and entirely too full of frills and flourishes; I am, of course, exceedingly fond of it as a result.

A Lady I

Dedicated to those of my sex who suffer needlessly.

A lady I, now taking the behest
Of friends and lovers also of my sex,
Let me decline to welcome any shame
That might derive from making more profane
Those rotes and rules (against which for my friends
I couch the hardened point of poet's pen)
Which crafted were to lay such gross disgrace
'Pon any woman rising o'er her place
As to forever render her unfit
For any further comment politic-
In woman's name I therefore do reject
The rude attempt to render us subject
To that most self-imposèd tyranny
That virtu'os women call Virginity.

Ah, gentle reader, do not be so shocked!
No crueler shackle must needs be unlocked
Than that which we ourselves are gaoler for,
Yet stay in Virtue's name the prisoner,
Frustrating for our honor every lust
That men indulge, as if our gender must
By virtue of our aching chastity
Make balance for their rude profanity,
Creating of our natural appetites
A dark, unspoken sort of sacrifice;
A mystic ritual so delicate
That every woman in performing it
Some insubstantial thaumaturgy spends,
And such significance may never work again.

And are we not more suited to desire,
Whose touch and pleasuring have so inspired
The love of men that they themselves must claim
As their exclusive property our frames,
Ignoring all the gross incompetence
With which they stumble through the reverence
Of their romantic cabal's ritual,
The which we find an awkward parallel
At best to the unmitigated joy
That women craft where'er they lie conjoined,
Exchanging with a diplomatic grace
Such terms, though couched in tenderest embrace,
As each from each demands all resolute
A mutual surrender absolute.

Men's hold on women do I thus deny,
Relinquishing my vaunted chastity,
This which I never marked the value of
As somehow dear enough to purchase love,
Who, when first her fires warmed my breast
I sought to tempt with gentlest caress
And unashamed physicality
Or intimations of the ecstasy
That from a loving joining ever springs,
Not wooing with a downcast offering
Made more to custom than to tenderness;
Made less of love and more of artifice.
Oh maidens! Find in love divinity,
And no more bow to cruel virginity.

A.N. - I have received no small amount of criticism for this work,which has been accused of indecency, immorality, and a great deal of similar words, all of which I admit to being mostly true. There were originally two more verses, some parts of which were excised entirely, while others were worked into the first four. It gained me less acclaim than "The Horse," but I think it a better work, on the whole, and its sentiment not without merit.

Sonnets: In Exile

Dedicated on the eve of my parting from the Modas il Toralar to the shaman Grummak, also called Greatheart, who was first to warn me.

Ah, storied wandr'er of our histories,
Who from my humble pen derived the name
That gave itself unto your mortal fame
And strayed beyond your poor mortality,
Who once derived from mocking poetry
That sobriquet that conquered every shame
Which once your memory might have profaned,
How can I likewise 'scape from infamy?
With cruel and sudden exile now faced,
I hear the pale rider spur his horse,
And give the headsman needs for sharpening:
The every sin the Greatheart once escaped
I find myself now guilty of and worse,
And have no cause as he for pardoning.

And oh, you many who decried my choice,
How can I now with too-late, trembling words
Beg mercy of you, who so long endured
That fearfulness, so long disguised as poise,
Which lent its venom to my poet's voice,
Or pray that in my exile from my lord
Your sentiment might stay the earnèd sword
Whose heavy fall you only should rejoice?
In exile stripped of all but dignity,
How she, who loved when love was suicide
Must mount with elegance the scaffold stair!
That all who, seeing her mortality,
Must nod at least in passing to her pride,
And offer for the love it sheltered prayer.


A.N. - These were more of an exercise in an alternate sonnet form and an apology to Grummak's memory than the self-laments they seem. They sold quite well, and prompted several tributes in verse from admirers at the time.

Drink to Me and To My Memory

Drink to me and to my memory
And I will drink to yours.
We have our cups, our wine, our friends,
Our songs, our fights, our !@#$%s.
So spill a glass upon the ground
And let me likewise pour
A tribute to my husband once;
My husband evermore.

And let there be no marital band,
No chain between we two
That might in some way lessen me,
Or else diminish you,
But rather let us gladly pay
The other each their due,
And rather than deceitful joined
Stay separately true.

A cup for you, a cup for me,
A cup for what we might have been,
And if a tear should ever be,
Drink another cup again.

A.N. - The first line of the second stanza does not scan, because at the time I had not realized that "marital" and "martial" were separate words in Orcish (indeed, it had always seemed fitting to me that the same word for "of a military nature" could also mean "of a wedded nature). My publisher corrected the spelling error, inadvertently lengthening the line by an out-of-place syllable, and there it has remained ever since.

The Voice of the Horde

A Poem in the Common Tongue of Our Peoples

A thousand years beneath the tears
Of weeping jungle skies
Our ancient clan stretched forth its hand
To make the world our prize.
And in our pride we reached too high,
And now there is no weeping sky,
And now the ancient tribal cry
Is muted in our sighs.

What bargain made has ope'd the shade
And sun of those dry plains
Where once no hooves but ours dared move
To other's clam'ring claims?
A way of life was sacrificed
To pay the conquerors the price
Of this our city on the rise -
So far from earth estranged!

What mortal loss could match the cost
Of immortality,
Whose heavy chain shall long restrain
From us sweet Death's reprieve?
Our spirits cannot hope to roam,
Nor hope to call these bodies home,
But only raise our wailing groans
To lost humanity.

And now there come the sounding drums,
Ne'er 'gain to be ignored
Who permeate our every fate
And speak our every word.
To this, we sacrifice our pride!
For this, our way of life denied!
We bow before your conqu'ring ride,
You mighty Orcish Horde!

A.N. - Older readers may find significance in the fact that this rather bitter work was written during the ascendency of the ill-fated Horde Council. I still think it a fitting work, and a reminder of the inequalities that still permeate our racial diaspora. Obviously, it would require at least two more stanzas were it written today, but I have never moved myself to go back and add verses for the elven and goblin concerns.


On a Recent Victory in the Alterac Valley

How nimbly we, like children, slip and slide
Upon the snowy mountain slopes!
I slid and fell, but childlike, never cried,
Nor never thought how many 'fore me died,
But rose again, and laughing, joined the ride
Back up the mountain of our hopes.
The flag, the flag! Go up the hill; lay claim!
Oh run, you glist'ning youth, and play!
A mother now, and yet I joined your game,
And for a little while we were the same,
And never gave a thought to any pain
We gave each other on the way.
Oh come, my darling children, come inside -
The shadows deepen on the slopes.
Return to me, your faces flushed with pride,
And think a while on what you have denied
Those blessed children of the other side -
So swiftly too may go our hopes.

A.N. - There was no need to brag of it in the poem, but the victory referred to was under my command, and cemented my service to the Frostwolf Clan. They awarded me the Eye of Command, and I was pleased to respond with this verse. I do not think they knew what to make of it.


Song of Our City

My suffering sister has no fear of these streets -
The patron does not pause.
Her clothing makes an offer like a peddler;
The money goes within the shawls.
A baker gives a child an extra sweet
The politician has his cause
And I - I am myself no better,
Though now beyond their calls.
The blacksmith roughly grasps his iron rod;
I watch it plunge into the coals.
The warmth envelops it in softness;
The farmhand births the foal.
A prayer offers up a hope to god
A poem offers up a soul.
The burial of each is profitless;
The funeral is all.
A city walk returns me such a price;
You buy a poem with control -
The prostitute completes her rude exchange;
You hear the story told.
A maiden weeps as she becomes a wife,
A man as he grows old;
The mother bleeds into the midwife's drain
As the city streets grow cold.

A.N. - This was the last poem I published in Orcish, and I have not written that many since, even for myself. It was not well-received, and some very harsh words were said before the public had moved on to other affairs. I begin to regret my withdrawal, and may some day soon contribute again to this Collected Works in the language of the Horde.

-Arjah

((And that's the lot -- the character limit on these forums is not forgiving, but I think I managed not to chop anything up too badly, apart from breaking the first sonnet cycle into two pieces.))

((You have a talent I envy:) I stick with prose because I have never been able to keep a proper meter in my head>.< ))

((You have a talent I envy:) I stick with prose because I have never been able to keep a proper meter in my head>.< ))

((Oh, a little meter goes a long way. Mine's a bit of a sledgehammer in most of these.

I'd like to say that it's deliberate roleplaying -- Arjah being the sort of woman who'd incline naturally to flowery, overwrought verse -- but that would give the entirely untrue suggestion that I could do better if I put my mind to it.

This is, I'm sorry to say, as good as it gets, but it was fun to put it all together and read through it again.))

Make one for Abominusss, yesss?

*makes Sparkling Maggot Eyes at Arjah, along with billions of other eager maggot eyes eyeing the She-troll*

*off the top of her head*

Dere once was a fella named 'Bomi
Who carried his worms in his tummy
In shows of defiance
He plagued de Alliance
Who ran from him, screamin' for Mommy.

Na' quite a sonnet, but den, ya ain' quite a beautiful-yet-unattainable love a'ma life, eitha. We take wha' we can get...

The Lord Aziel V'Ghera of the Modas il Toralar and I had just had a fierce dispute over public policy (which I was always better at), and his rebuke stung me into writing this. I was, unsurprisingly, expelled from the order almost immediately after; to my credit, I never did publish the companion satire "The Hollow Tower."[/i]

(( Arjah does have a flair for dramatic conflict at times :P Or perhaps I should say she did. Your character (and maybe even Dree) seem to have matured over time. They must be getting old. ))

[quote]
(( Arjah does have a flair for dramatic conflict at times :P Or perhaps I should say she did. Your character (and maybe even Dree) seem to have matured over time. They must be getting old. ))

((Or you and I just don't have endless evening hours to spend sitting up creating new in-character agonies for one another, more likely. I'm afraid we quite ended Arjah's career as a poet. I only write out-of-character verse nowadays.))