The Song of Babel - A story in Verse

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(For best reading effect: Grab your headfones and play the attached music)




In a far away time, at a far away place
Long before the great son had arrived
There was a king with great ambitions
Whose people he had let well thrive

Before the great son was placed at the altar
The same one that walked on water
This king had a place in the hearts
Of the people who lived near and afar

As a mark of his great reign
And to leave a legacy for his bloodline
He wished to build a tower so tall
That rose to the skies to house one and all

He sought the greatest minds and toughest hands
From across the seas, the mountains and neverland
To help his dream come true
And prove his blood was blue

Men from all corners indeed came
Supreme minds of creative names
They planned and plotted the tower so high
To build it needed godly will and might

But as they pushed the tower’s height
It came crashing down left and right
The greatest minds and the strongest hands
Was as puzzled as the King himself, who wondered,
What is lacking in their plans and plots
Its not the lack of stones or marbles or gold ingots
The brilliance of the east and the west did meet
With the elephants of strength and yet this defeat?

The King sent word for a mind with answer
for a clue or a hint or a sign or a pointer
Men on horse back rode with the winds
Carrying the will of reward from their king
They reached the ends of the plains and sailed the deep oceans
Cut through great forests and crossed mighty mountains

Until they reached a hamlet called Gaya
Whose people had a heart as warm as fire
The Kings men froze at the beauty and splendor
And the soft, soothing melody that peaked their wonder
The music they heard was from a divine fiddle
Whose notes felt like a gentle breeze twiddle

They went in search of the soul that played
The sheep that grazed and the peacocks that swayed
The land was rich said the rainbow in the sky
And the people who had a smile that never went dry
At a beautiful corner, by the lush green meadow
They saw the man with a fiddle, named Cleo

Oh great one, would you help our King
He that seeks his trouble’s meaning
The tower he wishes for the sky to touch
Is befallen with a curse he knows not much
Will you help our King’s dream come true
For he is truly the one with the blood so blue

I know not a king whose blood is blue
But I accept for your loyalty that’s so true
I am but a simple fiddler with a simple tune
And I belong to a people who pays me fortune
Not with their gold or silver or copper
But as a son to a father and a brother to a sister
A father to a son, I am
And a husband to Miriam
How can I leave my family and come
For I will carry their sorrow to your kingdom

The kings men agreed to take one and all
His family, his friends, his birds and animal
And they galloped to the far out sunset
To the King whose dreams with misfortune beset

The King sat in shock and wonderment
Of how this simple fiddler will finish his beloved monument
Oh Fiddler my men say you are great
Do you have the answer to my tower’s fate?

Yes, my lord, you have summoned the greatest minds
And the strength of a thousand elephants
But there is something that your gold cannot buy
It is the love you have for the tower where the secret lie
Which no great mind nor great hand can fake
With the plans they make and the actions they take

The king ran down from his altar
His cheeks wet with joyful tear
Oh great fiddler, your words have touched my heart
And answered my question like the last brick on the rampart
I will shower you with Gold and Diamonds and lasting riches
If you complete my tower before my end reaches
Blow your fiddle and spread your magic
Spread the love and heal the sick

And so the fiddler played his fiddle
With the breeze once again a twiddle
His notes were heard far and wide
Young and old now joined his tribe
The greatest minds and the powerful hands
Now joined in love with their egos behind
Quickly began the great tower’s rise
Far beyond the point of usual demise

As the days became months and months years
The fiddler’s tune gave strength to those longing ears
His tune spread magic and his notes were divine
For it was an example of love so deep and benign
Even the great Mother of the planet and the Father in the heavens
Lay suspended in deep adoration

His sons grew big, his wife grew old and his parents twice
But he stopped ageing with the strength of his purity
He played his fiddle and the tower grew tall
The love he put on the hearts of one and all

It was time for the final dome on the floor sky high
It wouldn’t sit right for a gap fiddle wide
Greatest minds and the greatest hands
Counseled the King for the fiddler’s mind
As he was asked, so did he give
The love of his heart torn from its hinge

The music stopped and the dome sat atop
From the ground the tower ran to the clouds
But into the height of the skies and taller than the rainbows
The word of the tower ran shy to the word of the fiddler’s sacrifice
The king’s dream came true
But he had yet to prove his blood so blue

Words were spoken and songs were written
Less of the King and his mighty monument
The fiddler who lost his fiddle and his notes
For the King’s tower, people wrote

Greatest minds and greatest hands
Once again counseled the King to act
For after the great tower build so high
The king and his glory lost to the fiddler well-nigh
And so the King rode with his horse men
Into the tower where the fiddler and his family were promised haven
They slayed and slaughtered as they rode higher
All the friends and family and children of the fiddler

They drove their swords into the body of the fiddler
Like animals that raged with merciless anger
The fiddler fell on the floor, with warm blood flowing
In shock and pain, looked aghast at the King
He then looked around and saw his family slain
His wife and children lay limp no more in pain

The fiddler looked up at the King, from an awful slump
Blood flowing out and flesh falling in gruesome lump
Oh mighty one, my lord, what have you done
There is no pain from the blows of your mighty blade
That exceeds the blow from your heart as reward to what I gave
I lay my heart in the fiddle I sacrificed
That I’d have gladly given my life had you asked

What have I done so horribly wrong that I have to witness
The cutting to pieces before my eyes, my family so innocent?
It was your love I saw, my lord, for the tower so high
That I loved as my own to reach the sky
Yet, you didn’t see mine through the notes I played
For if you had, there would never be a use for your blade

The fiddler spoke these words and breathed his last
Of a loving pain in his eyes brought back the past
The king and his benign rule, the noble wish for the mighty tower
For all his kingdom’s men and women, to live and prosper
What have I done, oh God! The King cried
When did I become greater than myself?
Of my tower and its gallant intent?

The king knelt in front of the lifeless fiddler
Held his limp hands and drew himself near
Forgive me, oh great one, for I have fallen
To the lowliest of life when I had a chance
To learn from a soul taller than any tower
The lesson of love and the purity of its power
I now know, my dear brother, what is false and true
It is the acts of kindness and not the blood so blue

The king flung his sword and ordered due respect
For the fiddler and his family who lay lifeless
The king gave away his throne
And walked away to the unknown
To find peace and solace
And perhaps find, the fiddler’s palace!


- Susheel nair
01/04/09