Poem: Answer to Horatius
Dispelling the Glory of War
ANSWER TO HORATIUS
by William Arthur Engels
February 24th, 2026
Based on “Lays of Ancient Rome” (1842) by Thomas Babington Macaulay.
to be read aloud…
MACAULAY:
XXVI
But the Consul’s brow was sad,
And the Consul’s speech was low,
And darkly looked he at the wall,
And darkly at the foe.
“Their van will be upon us
Before the bridge goes down;
And if they once may win the bridge,
What hope to save the town?”
XXVII
Then out spake brave Horatius,
The Captain of the Gate:
“To every man upon this earth
Death cometh soon or late.
And how can man die better
Than facing fearful odds,
For the ashes of his fathers,
And the temples of his gods?
(excerpt, Lays of Ancient Rome, 1842)
A man had once heard thusly,
And was moved to quick reply:
Inverting the phase, of this dull clamor
Hoping its spell, on the young, would die:
Bestride the windswept plains
of stallion-breaking Troy
a vast host gathered, arrayed and cloaked
to trade their deaths for joy.
Thus they massed: upon the cliffs
courting death for ten years and more:
And afflicted were they, on Troy’s ashes a’play
Seeing the wrack now washed ashore:
Twice golden aglow, this field of woe
Grips wet corpses with fingers of rose.
Aurora bedecks our ghastly wreck
All, the pink seafoam drags and rolls.
For in they had flashed, our Light Brigade
Upon the sounding of a bell
Our king, atop a Golden Tripod sat
Watching on numbly as we fell.
I our poet, began to retch,
Not inclined to think death well;
But still my song, bronze-lightning etched
though it could not carry the smell:
The reek of brine-soaked carrion,
Intestines draping black sand;
Ravens snapping up eyeballs,
As Death perfumes the land.
These are not - I then told Fate,
Verses for the Chorus back home.
Truer words, said I, shall have to wait
Until I am with thee, Athena, alone.
