Were you first there in Byzantium when Constantine was king? <br />Did you walk along the Bosphorus or the Golden Horn in spring? <br />Did you fight the Turkish armies when your empire was thread bare? <br />Did you find solitide in Ephes amongst the ruins there? <br />Did you paint Christ Pantocrator's in your monastery domes? <br />Did you regret the loss of empire and look longingly to Rome? <br />Did you just look on quietly when the city's walls were breached? <br />Did you fight well in the battle or rely on empty speech? <br />Did you then curse Byzantium for all those many things <br />That Byzantium still clung to just to glorify its kings? <br />For decay set in some time before the citadel was stormed <br />And the downfall of Byzantium lay in its crown of thorns <br />For Jesus and Byzantium were not a marriage made <br />Of love but of convenience, so its soul could not be saved.<br /><br />David Keig<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/at-byzantium/
