From the Shores of Styx

A baby cries
from the shores of Styx.

A child cries
from the darkness of a ghetto.

A baby cries,
and a child cries.

A mother cries
as a father dies.

A war starts.
Jobs end.
A house is lost.
A father dies.

The child grows.
The child says why,
but the man knows,
like those before him knew.

And so
the child sighed
as the man dies.

From the shores of Styx,
from the deepest part of Stygian,
a baby cries again—
screaming out of the darkness,
crawling out of the gloom,
refusing to keep the circle.

The child from the darkest recesses of Stygian
screams: I will fight for light,
and though I may lose
and die alone in the dark,
I will have created a glimmer
of hope.

As the man cries,
the woman dies,
and once again
a child rises from the darkness of Stygian,
screaming: I will create light.

And the circle remains
unbroken.

Author’s Note
In Greek mythology, Styx is both a goddess and the river that forms the boundary between the world of the living and the underworld. The rivers Styx, Phlegethon, Acheron, Lethe, and Cocytus all converge in a great marsh at the center of the underworld. The word Stygian refers to the deep darkness associated with that realm.