Sarah Ramsey
I’ve heard the tales about that prince:
The Prince of the Lowlands and Plains.
Prey and Predator say the myths,
Duality for he who reigns—
Son of the Wolf, Brother of the Deer.
I have my own tale. I saw him
when the skies poured the endless storm
and the valleys drowned in wet hymns,
He stood against himself in form:
Son of the Wolf, Brother of the Deer.
Their wounds encircled them in red,
Rinsed by the torrential downpour,
Evidence of their conflict spread
that the land may take account for
Son of the Wolf, Brother of the Deer.
A natural pause. Lungs inhale,
Eyes locked in a sea of hatred,
Waiting for one’s patience to fail.
Death may claim what’s long awaited:
Son of the Wolf, Brother of the Deer.
The storm veiled me as I witness
the Deer betrayed a single twitch;
Wolf broke forth in blind resistance,
not born of hunger, but of wish—
Son of the Wolf at Brother of the Deer.
The buck’s antler pierces the throat,
Wolf’s teeth tear where the blood runs thin;
my eyes avert the gore afloat—
His sword, his hand, his pain, one skin.
O, for naught, Prince of the Lowlands!
I wade to him through broken rain,
the flood still roaring past our knees.
I cupped his face, slick with storm and pain,
and asked him softly, Why must this be,
Prince of the Lowlands?
He said the sky has lost its mind,
the rivers choke the fields to death.
‘I stood to guard what gods declined,
to bare my teeth, to spend my breath.
If thunder comes, I’ll meet it head,
If rain devours, I’ll make it bleed.
A prince must rise where gods have fled,
or drown beside his starving creed
as Son of the Wolf and Brother of the Deer.’
I tell him storms are not all sky,
nor floods all born of heaven’s will.
‘The gods do not demand you die,
but ask you face what turns you still.
The storm they set before your eyes
was never rain nor river’s swell.
It lives where Wolf and Deer both lie,
and only there can you quench hell,
O my Prince of the Lowlands.’
His breath grows thin, the rain draws near,
his hand still clenched as if to fight.
I hold him fast and whisper clear:
The gods chose you to choose the light,
O my Prince of the Lowlands.
The rain relents, though clouds remain,
Heat returns, his chest now rises.
Not spared by gods, nor cleansed of pain,
but granted breath a second time.
The Prince of the Lowlands sings again.
We parted paths when dawn returned,
the storm thinned out, the river slowed.
I saw him once more, changed, discerned—
not running toward what still bestowed,
Son of the Wolf, Brother of the Deer.
The Wolf still waits on distant stone,
the Deer stands watch beyond the trees.
They do not charge. They are not one.
They hold the line, restrained, at ease.
Son of the Wolf, Brother of the Deer.
He stands between them, blood still warm,
not blade nor antler in his hand.
No longer storming toward the storm,
but learning how to guard the land,
All hail the Prince of the Highlands.