Terracotta Army, by Katherine Barrett Swett

Terracotta Army (China) c. 210 BCE. xiquinhosilva, CC BY 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Terracotta Army

Another clear night sky,
trees stand around the field.
Strong winds beat them down,
ashes fallen on the ground.

Trees stand around the field,
statues attending an emperor.
Ashes fallen on the ground,
a devastation that we fear.

Statues attending an emperor;
everything they knew is gone,
a devastation that we fear.
Only the rocks remain.

Everything they knew is gone.
Cities returned to sand and mud.
Only the rocks remain,
and we won’t know what we’ve done.

Cities returned to sand and mud.
Strong winds beat them down,
and we won’t know what we’ve done.
Another clear night sky.

Katherine Barrett Swett

​​Katherine Barrett Swett has published poems in various journals including, The Lyric, Rattle, Mezzo Cammin, The Raintown Review, The Evergreen Review, and Measure. Her sonnets were twice finalists for the Nemerov Prize. Erica Dawson selected Swett’s collection, Voice Message, (Autumn House Press 2020) for the 2019 Donald Justice Poetry Prize. Her chapbook, Twenty-One, was published by Finishing Line Press in 2016.