Thursday Sonnet: To Mars

If by the light of Romulus and Remus
You spelt revenge upon us for the sons
Of dissipated Troy, burnt out like suns
Before you saw their fruit of rage, then deem us
Too glad to be condemned, who knelt to lick
For thirty centuries the arid stone
Which brother’s blood had baptised as a throne.
Your laurel is now withered; Rome fell sick
And died; yet still we honour those who stood
Upon the Palatine to draw your line.
You let an empire from that guiltless blood
Let forth a stream of song – and it is mine.
Your punishment remains misunderstood.
In this, perhaps, it truly is divine.