O bardling, o bardling, o servant of song,
please stay in your village where your kin belong:
these very real threats you coquettishly chase
are unlike the others you'd likely have faced.

O bardling, o bardling, o servant of art,
so little you know of this peril at heart.
You speak and you sing and it's all neatly skewed:
you've shown to us your understanding is crude.

O bardling, o bardling, o servant of rhyme,
your own compositions require my time
to teach and to lecture on heretics' acts:
I can only hope your mind's open to facts.

O Evil, o Evil, it's Westward you'll find,
although I must say that it seems in your mind
that we of Targossas to Sartan adhere--
which shows you know nothing about the Dawnspear.

The Dawnspear, the Dawnspear, is sharp-edged indeed:
its power is great, but then greater's the need
for defence of Creation from those who would stand
with Chaos, with Evil, with Darkness in hand.

Oppression, Oppression, o Elder Shaitan,
the essence of Strength is 'you take as you can,
and take even more when the weaker object'--
these weaker the Dawnspear would rather protect.

O Suff'ring, o Suff'ring, o master of Pain,
Apollyon's wounding his beauty did stain.
He held that the knowledge of pain could make pure--
and yet even this wound the Light could have cured.

O Chaos, o Chaos, Oblivion's song,
it never seems shrill and it never seems wrong.
It feeds on your anger, your scorn, and your fear,
it whispers the sweetest of lies in your ear.

O Nothing, o Nothing, Oblivion's wage,
Deucalion's foe from the earliest age,
It calls to its bedside the strangest of friends,
who blindly support this, the harshest of ends.

My Goddess, my Goddess, set my words alight,
and show these poor souls that, yes, this is a fight
in which they've an interest in helping the Dawn,
and not aiding Chaos as its hapless pawn.

The feeblest, the feeblest of plans do you hatch--
but for these foul forces, you're sadly no match,
and vict'ry for them would find all you love pass
from this noble world-- and then your peace at last.

Caer Wittrin, Caer Wittrin, will you render aid?
Or will you in wages of Nothing be paid?
With Nothing in hand, and with Nothing to save,
it's only the road to the End that you pave.

Penned by my hand on the 24th of Phaestian, in the year 644 AF.