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Alexander Shrine
Dedicated to the greatest man who ever lived |
Poems
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Abstract
Shining, bright
Spark into life
Laughter! Light!
Success, strife
Raised on love and hate
Bravery next to tears
Redemption too late
Far too few years
Conquest, conquered
Lived by love
No one reassured
Can't rise above
Betrayed somehow
Death of a friend
Even love must bow
Beginning! End!
My King
Alexander is my King
Whatever those words may bring
I know they are true
Nothing I wouldn't do
For him I would die
Or say good-bye
For him I live
My life I give
Some call this obsessed
Some call it depressed
I call it my joy
My innocent ploy
He is my reason
He is every season
He is my north star
No matter how far
Between him and me
He always will be
My heart and my head
Although he is long dead. |
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Essays
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Reasons
Some people are probably wondering my reasons for creating this page. Sure, admiring a historical figure is great, but isn't making a page devoted to them a little overboard?
No, it's not. Maybe it is if you only admire them, if you think they're interesting or a great speaker or you would like to be like them. Then a shrine might be pushing it. But I don't feel that way about Alexander.
I do admire him, yes. But it isn't his ability to win a battle that I admire, or anything like that. I admire him as a person. I would admire him as much if he were just a common soldier; although then, of course, I would never have heard of him.
Interested in him? Of course! He's one of the most fascinating figures in history. I am swept away by stories of his bravery, or of his kindness. I am entranced by his battle plans, by moments in fiction where he is speaking to Hephaestion or another who he was close to. I am constantly driven by curiosity to find out more about his life, more about his mind. I am interested in him in a way I am interested in few other things. But it is not an outsiders' interest. It is not an interest driven by having the knowledge and being able to use it or show it off. It is an interest such as one might have about anyone they care deeply about. I want to know him.
I would not want to be like him. I must state that immediately unless people misunderstand my fascination in his life. Second I must state that I don't feel there is anything wrong with him, so that people don't think I am slighting him. I wouldn't want to be like him for the following reasons:
His life was harder than anyone sane would wish theirs to be;
I am myself and can't contemplate any other existence;
Aspiring to be like him could only be disaster, for his campaigns could not have been handled so successfully and tolerantly by any other person;
Were I like him I would not be able to feel for him the way I do. Were I like him I wouldn't be able to tell people about him, or stand up for him when people are speaking negatively of him; if I did, it would be considered purely driven by self-interest. In short, were I like I him I would not be able to appreciate who he was.
The honest truth, the reason behind all of this, is that I love him. I'm not sure what kind of love it is; I don't know if it can be classified. I don't think I'm in love with him; nor is it a purely non-romantic love such as someone might feel for a friend or a brother. But it is love. I'm familiar enough with the emotion to recognize it as love, in some form or reality.
I can see him (a poetic essay)
I can see him in my mind. His body is strong, but not over-muscular; he has the body of a runner. Light, well built, and agile. His hands are those a warrior, and those of a physician. There are plenty of small wounds on those hands, and plenty of almost un-noticeable scars. They are strong and nimble, the fingers finely formed, and gentle. The thing you notice most about his hands is the gentleness, the caring, the warmth. Sometimes it seems almost as if a touch of his hands could cure; sometimes it seems as if a touch of his hands could kill. A sword held in those hands is deadly; but you would never have to fear poison from those hands.
His hair is thick, almost curling but not quite. The color is difficult to define; it can be golden in the sun, dark in the twilight, and gleam with red that isn't only reflection in the firelight. Below that rich tangle of glory is an almost ordinary, almost perfect, well balanced face. It is his face mostly that makes him look even younger than he is. The skin is almost perfect. Browned from the sun, slightly creased, but clear and stretched firmly but not too tightly over the bones and flesh of his face. His mouth is crinkled in a half-smile that can on its own make people love him and follow him, want to turn that smile into a full one, a friendly, loving one, directed only at them. The bones of his face are strong, but not harsh. The jawbone is noticeable, but not jutting; the cheekbones fine and only noticeable enough to draw attention to his eyes.
His eyes. There is so much to say about those eyes, yet it is so hard to put the wonder of them into words. They are the color of the sea; they are as many colors as the sea, as changeable as the sea. They are deep, clear pools that hold something entirely unexpected in a face so young. Perhaps it is wisdom, or a sadness so profound that you would expect it to take a lifetime of hardships to reach. But they are glowing with life, and can spark with joy or laughter or love so quickly that it takes your breath away. It hurts me to think that those pools of light will so soon turn to a raging grief, unquenchable except by death.
Case for Alexander
(I wrote this for The Greatest Military Commander, but decided that I may as well put it on my own site too.)
What is so great about the great Alexander?
That is a question that has been debated again and again. There are some who say nothing, and some who say everything. There are some who say his military genius, and some who say his compassion and kindness.
If I were going to explain everything great about him in enough detail, I would have to make a whole book out of it. There are too many issues to be addressed, too many arguments to be rebuked, and too many possibilities and theories to be discussed for me to provide a complete and comprehensive discussion of why Alexander is the greatest military commander.
So in this paper, I will tackle the job that I think I can accomplish: supplying a successful argument for why Alexander was so great. This isn't a historical paper, it's a commentary. My information is of course derived from history books, and I suggest that anyone interested in learning more about Alexander reads one of those instead of turning to this or any other opinion-ridden article or paper.
So, let's start over again: What is so great about the great Alexander? What makes him the greatest military commander ever? Why, indeed, am I writing this?
He was not only a great military commander. To understand him, you must go much farther than that classification. Alexander was a military genius. He was a kind man. He was a true leader, a King.
He never lost a battle. His men adored him, and he respected them. He fought with his army, and didn't ask anyone to take risks he wasn't willing to take. Toward the end of his campaigns, he did lose some of his closeness with them, as well as some of his mental stability, but I think it is still safe to say that when he died there were very few who didn't grieve him personally.
Among the people who he conquered, there was certainly some anger toward him, but there was also an astonishing amount of respect and even fondness. He encouraged, and even to a degree adopted, their culture and customs. He didn't kill when it wasn't necessary, and even made friends with the family of the Persian King Darius.
He accomplished things no Greek King had managed before him. He earned the admiration, whether affectionate or frightened, of almost everyone whose lives he touched. He was a frightening man in battle, a brilliant tactician, and a diplomatic leader. To his friends he offered unending loyalty; to his enemies he offered ruthlessness but also mercy.
Did he make mistakes? Of course. He made as many mistakes as anyone, and his mistakes are more dangerous than many. But he, unlike many leaders throughout history, always managed to admit that a mistake had been made, that he had done something he shouldn't have.
Did he have problems? Yes, he most certainly did. His issues with his parents are too numerous and complex to mention, but I think they greatly affected his later life and later issues. He drank, and did regrettable things when drunk. He was not perfect, and his problems were perhaps more like to effect everyone than the problems of most people. But his problems are not reasons to dislike him, they are reasons to pity him and to sympathize with him better. More than anything, the knowledge of his problems is a way to better understand his successes.
No other military leader has done what he did, or been what he was. Certainly no other leader has managed to achieve the levels of success and recognition that he did all by the age of thirty-three. He was not just a military man, and therefore what makes him the greatest one can't be explained in pure military terms. He was a scholar, an artist, an explorer, a soldier, a scientist, and mostly a friend. He influenced the world so profoundly that the human mind today can hardly comprehend it. His influences may not have been entirely positive, but they were certainly great. The title, I believe, has never been so fittingly bestowed as it was on Alexander. |
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Uncategorized
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Visions
I will never break through the thousands of years that the fates placed between us, like so many feet of muddy water. Books are the only thing that can clear that water for me, so that I may see him; even though the image is distorted from ripples in the minds of those that wrote of him, the man I see in my mind is clear, true, and good. The proof of that is everywhere in his body.
As I read of his hands, I see the lands
As he wins them with love and with valor;
As I read of his eyes, I realize
what in them could captivate hundreds;
As I read of his hair, I'm somehow there
combing it, feeling it, smelling it;
As I read of his feet, I hear defeat
for those that would stop them from walking;
As I read of his knee, I almost see
as he kneels to comfort the wounded;
As I read of his shoulder, I feel bolder
knowing what he would willing bear;
As I read of his mind, I can define
what it takes to be a real leader.
Tears of a King
"How can I rule if I cannot even command the army that I see every day, the men that I fight beside?"
Alexander had tears in his eyes, but by strength of willpower he was keeping them from accumulating enough to roll down his cheeks. Were it anyone but Hephaestion, he would not even have allowed them to come to his eyes. But there was nothing that he wished to hide from Hephaestion, not even his weaknesses.
"They love you," Hephaestion replied, putting a hand on his King and dearest friend's shoulder. He couldn't bear seeing Alexander this upset. He was never able to bear seeing Alexander hurt, whether physically or emotionally, and he often wished that Alexander were a farmer or a potter instead of a King, something that would make his life simpler and put him in less danger.
"No," Alexander said. Then, "I don't know who to trust any more, Hephaestion."
"They only want to go home," Hephaestion said. "Can you blame them? Not all were blessed to have those that are most important to them with them on the campaign."
"That isn't what I meant." he turned his head away, as if looking for danger. When he turned back there was a sort of weary fear in his eyes. "I have become too powerful, and made too many enemies. I'm scared, Hephaestion. There are a lot who respect me, I know, but there are also some that don't. There are some that think they would be better off without me. There are enough. And the worst of it is, I don't know who. It could be anyone. I want to trust my men, you know that. I want to trust all of my generals, as I used to. But I can't, not anymore."
"You can trust me," Hephaestion said around the lump of sadness in his throat. He knew that Alexander was right, and he feared that it was only a matter of time before an assassin got through the protection he and some of the others who could be trusted tried to put around Alexander. He knew that Alexander would never be the same happy young man he had first found that he loved, the young man who he had tried so hard to prove his loyalty to. There was still light in those eyes, but lately he had been seeing all too often a shadow that tried to overpower it.
Alexander smiled. "I know," he said softly. "Without that, I would have gone mad long ago." He put one hand over Hephaestion's, and used the other to gently stroke his cheek.
Hephaestion smiled in response both to Alexander's smile and his touch. "I'll be here for you," he assured the King. "For as long as I live, I'll be here."
"When we return to Macedon, I'm going to live an uneventful life." Alexander said suddenly. "I'm going to let other people handle things for me, and all I'll have to do is make sure they're doing their jobs properly. You and I, Hephaestion, can go riding and talk about history and philosophy and science and literature, and maybe some time I can find the chance to slip off for a few days and we can go into the mountains and not have to deal with anyone else." he laughed at the thought. "We can hunt every day for our food, and sleep under nothing but the stars, and nobody will even know where we are."
Feeling better now that Alexander seemed happier, Hephaestion laughed with him. "But what if it rains?"
His plans weren't to be dampened by a little thing like rain, though. "Then we'll get wet, Hephaestion. We'll go in the summer, so we won't get cold, and then we will get as wet as a pair of responsibility free fish." His laughter subsided a bit, and he added, "Once we get back to Macedon."
Hephaestion opened his arms, and Alexander gratefully allowed himself to be wrapped in them. If either had looked in the other's eyes, they would have seen a melancholy longing. In Hephaestion's, for the memory of the familiar lands where they had grown up, and in Alexander's, for the sorrow of leaving behind the lands and the peoples who he had come to consider his own; and in both, for the knowledge that the wills of gods and men could tear them away from both.
A poem written by me and Sky
Alexander was greater than anyone today
He is truely the best, a wonderful man, no matter what stupid people say.
When he died all of his people grieved
Through his life they followed him lovingly
He was a man of great power, he lived his name in full.
He was one of those people who was who he should be
He was greater than great, for him death came too soon. He will outlive his time.
I only wish that everyone out there could see
What a man is supposed to be.
Dear Alexander,
We still remember you.
That, I think, is most important for you to know. You've not been forgotten. It's been thousands of years since you were alive, yet there are still people who feel that somehow they know you. That is the strength of your personality, the strength of what you accomplished.
There are a lot of people, I regret to inform you, who think poorly of you. There are a lot who call you nothing more than a killer, a lot who repeat mistaken or blatantly untrue things about you, and sometimes even try to pass them off as history. Then there are those who only say these things about you because they figure it's safe to insult someone who's dead, that you are a prime target because most people know so very little and even those who know wouldn't go so far as to retaliate for your sake. But then there are the few, myself and some others, who are here to show them how very mistaken they are.
Things have gone pretty badly in the world, since you were here. Conquering the world is a fad now, but nobody knows how to properly do it like you did. Sometimes I think that's why people are mistaken about you, because they compare you to all the rest. People don't car about other people anymore, they don't care about knowledge and they don't understand anything but their own realities. Throughout the many, many years since your death, there have been many heroes, and many that are remembered as heroes but never did anything heroic. There have been many good people, it's important that we remember that, but there have been increasing numbers of people who want nothing but power and wealth. There have been those who learn not only from their own mistakes but from the mistakes of others, and those who learn from nothing. But all throughout it, Alexander, we have remembered you.
I know how important love was to you, and I know that if you read this letter you wouldn't reject what I say as nothing but attempts to gain favor. It's certainly not that, because there's no favor to gain anymore. You're gone, and you'll never read this letter, but I still feel compelled to write it. I can't say why. Perhaps it is for myself, so that I can better imagine your response to it. Perhaps it is for the people who read it to see the level of determination in my quest to better the world's opinion of you. Perhaps, and this one most likely, it is some childish fantasy that perhaps you somehow are reading this, perhaps you somehow do know of me and are accepting my love…
I have, and probably will continue to, go to great lengths for the memory of you. I busy myself with setting to rights mistruths about you, and to encouraging people to see and accept who you truly were. In the time since I realized my goal, my duty even, I have annoyed a good number of people, positively infuriated a few, and befriended some. I'm not alone in this quest, although sometimes I am lonely in it. But we will prevail. Have faith in us. You can't defend yourself anymore, but we can and will defend you. It will be a long struggle, one perhaps never over, but we won't allow your memory to slip away into half-truths, myths, and slanders.
And don't think that we have included only you in this, either. Hephaestion and your friends will be protected, as well, because we know how important they were to you. Each of us, your self-appointed defenders, has our own views and our own particular opinions of the tangle of information we are presented with about you. None of us is capable, or even desires, to cover all matters of your life and the lives of those who touched you, but I think between the many of us we cover a good deal. I can't be certain, because information about you is so dim, but we do try. Eventually, many of us may get tired of our quest, and give up on it or unintentionally veer away from it. But there will be new people to take their place in the ranks of those who care about you, whether personally or historically.
So rest easy, my King. We are here to watch over you while you sleep and dream of a world far better than this one. We miss you, we remember you, and we love you. |
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~Created by Beryl Alexandros, Friend of Alexander
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