1
There is a law above the law of man
It has no name, but when we think of it
And feel its power, what can we call it but
Death
Because we are aware of death
Because we are aware
Because, to throne the race of men above
Creation's beastliness, Prometheus
Graced mankind with the vanity of mind
We mind the fleeting when
Over the harmony of now,
And fall like lightning to our graves
Because all things that live are ruled by law
There is a law above the law of man
That calls us to rebel against our state
It has no name, but when we think of it
And feel its power, what can we call it but
Life
When Phaeton, son of Apollo, died
Apollo threw submission to the dogs
And yoked the tyrant Time to his chariot,
Driving the flaming stallions of the sun
Against their given course, to drag the day
Back to the dawn before
But he failed, for all his strength
To do more than abuse the tortured earth
And fashion failure from a godlike rage
Because even the gods are ruled by law
There is a law above the law of man
That calls us to rebel against our state
That orders respect even from immortals
It has no name, but when we think of it
And feel its power, what can we call it but
Time
Because we cannot rest until we die
Because we cannot rest
Life is the rage of always against never,
Never to do more than abuse the earth
And godlike Achilles, complete in revolt
Drags the dead body of yesterday's triumph
Down to the unforgiving grave of love
His is the power of supremacy
His equal's body fishes back and forth
Behind his chariot, defiled
Before the eyes of his father
But not even Achilles can re-kill the dead
Because all things that are
Are ruled
There is a law above the law of man
That calls us to rebel against our state
That orders respect even from immortals
That unifies the breach of life and death
It has no name, but when we think of it
And feel its power, what can we call it but
God
2Here in the kingdom of time everlasting
We sit before the life that lies ahead of us
Like happy children in an empty theatre
Thrilled at the anything-can-happen magic
That shines the clearest when the stage is dark
But when the play begins, when we have lived
The only life we get, we look behind
To see that what we once thought was our freedom
Was just the prospect of the unportrayed
God, let our days be what we do with them
Not what they do to us
Let us grow taller than the tree that bore us
For the generation of men are like leaves
Old ones dropped brittle to the withered grass
Young shoots full of green promise in the spring
Filling the branch and falling, flowering
Even as other flowers fall and rise
Upon the battlefield of life and death
Where we are each besieged and sacked
While in rebellious overthrow against
The capital decree of flesh and blood
Abandoned here by all but history
And justice and the cause within ourselves
We fight to see the day we fight no more
The war for which the human race was madeCopyright ages and ages ago by Matthew J Wells
