Offsite Post: ‘Zebulon Lee’

 

The eyes of Zebulon Lee stared blankly

In the harsh LED light of his apartment,

His red hair hanging loosely about his bearded face,

Alone in Virginian Alexandria.

In the blink of an eye, he found he was not.

 

Saint John the Baptist:

These lights will make you go blind, you know.

 

Zebulon:

Stranger, I feel that I have long been wandering

In a trackless waste.

 

St. John:

                                      You speak truly,

For your father Constantius risked much to find

The precious treasure you so glibly stow

On your countertop.

 

[Another visitor appears.]

 

Herod:

But why should he concern himself with this,

This musty flesh?  Look what trouble it has brought

To his life – His father is dead and the house of Lee

Is heaped with loathsome shame.  Constantius

Believed in the power of a dead man’s hand

To unify his people, but found himself

Mocked and murdered by secret police.

 

St. John:

What is your advice for the man, then, Herod?

 

Zebulon:

Herod?

 

St. John:

                Herod, yes.  What course should he take?

 

Herod:

There is only one sure path to power

In this world:  Take it by force!  Constantius,

Like Robert before him, wouldn’t stain his sword

With his enemies’ blood.  Those they opposed

Remain as rulers, themselves now in ignominy.

Avenge them, pitiful young Lee, sitting weakly

On the floor!  Take up sword and gun, knife and poison,

Kill those who humiliated your kinsmen,

And be the strong ruler they refused to be!

 

Zebulon [Stands.]:

You speak with boldness, sir, as one who knows,

Rather than who shares a speculation.

But I, too, have read a little history,

And know what end awaits a governor

Whose rule is founded on seas of blood.  You slew

Wife and sons, dozens of the Sanhedrin,

And fourteen-thousand young innocent babes,

That you might cling a little more securely

To your sweet power.  What did it avail?

You died anyway, and mis’rably, hated by all.

 

Herod [Spits at Zebulon.]:

And who are you – Good King Alfred, reborn?

Going to lead the Southern people with prayers

And baubles to victory over the Northmen

From your little hovel, your own sad Athelney?

 

Zebulon:

Who I am, or shall be, is no concern

Of yours.  Be gone!

 

Herod:

                                    A curse fall upon you!

 

[Disappears.]

 

Zebulon  [To St. John]:

You have been mighty quiet throughout, Stranger.

 

St. John:

Evil has a way of defeating itself,

At times.

 

Zebulon:

                        And yet at other times it persists.

For two hundred years, my people have had to wear

The Yankee yoke.  My father believed the hand

Of St. Andrew would safeguard us, but he died,

And we are again unfree.  Was his faith misplaced?

 . . .

The rest is at https://www.reckonin.com/walt-garlington/zebulon-lee.

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Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!

Anathema to the Union!