{"id":4078,"date":"2023-11-26T09:47:54","date_gmt":"2023-11-26T16:47:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/?p=4078"},"modified":"2023-11-26T09:47:54","modified_gmt":"2023-11-26T16:47:54","slug":"selaphesne","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/?p=4078","title":{"rendered":"SELAPHESNE"},"content":{"rendered":"

SELAPHESNE, by Kevin Sandefur, with artwork by Simon Walpole<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The proud banners tremble and drift as they fall,<\/p>\n

Like a tapestry tumbling soft from the wall,<\/p>\n

But there aren\u2019t any guards left to answer the call<\/p>\n

Of the palace bugle.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

It sounds out so sprightly, so sweet, and so clear,<\/p>\n

With a luster that sings in the patriot\u2019s ear,<\/p>\n

But no brave souls remain now alive who can hear<\/p>\n

Its final challenge.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

For the city has fallen, the empire\u2019s lost.<\/p>\n

Yet finally whelmed only at great cost<\/p>\n

Were its last defenders.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

All in silence now are the broad streets paved.<\/p>\n

Its heroes all slaughtered, its people enslaved,<\/p>\n

The city sleeps<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

And dreams of empires yet to be born,<\/p>\n

And the clarion calls of still distant horns<\/p>\n

To be.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

But for now, no more bright sounds arise from its stones<\/p>\n

Save the chitter of insects, the rattle of bones,<\/p>\n

And the small voice that whispers from long empty thrones<\/p>\n

The lesson of history: \u201cNo one may contend<\/p>\n

with the final mad grandeur at all glory\u2019s end.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

________________________________________<\/span><\/p>\n

Kevin Sandefur is the Capital Projects Accountant for the Champaign Unit 4 School District. His fiction has appeared in The Saturday Evening Post, The Gateway Review, The Sunlight Press, and Pulp Literature. He lives with his wife and two cats in Champaign County, Illinois, which is a magical place where miracles happen almost every day, and hardly anyone seems to find that remarkable.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Simon Walpole has been drawing for as long as\u00a0he can remember and is fortunate to spend his freetime working as an illustrator.\u00a0He primarily use pencils, pens and markers and use a bit of digital for tweaking. As well as doing interior illustrations for various publishing formats\u00a0he has\u00a0also drawn a lot of maps for novels. his work can be found at his website\u00a0HandDrawnHeroes<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SELAPHESNE, by Kevin Sandefur, with artwork by Simon Walpole   The proud banners tremble and drift as they fall, Like a tapestry tumbling soft from the wall, But there aren\u2019t any guards left to answer the call Of the palace bugle.   It sounds out so sprightly, so sweet, and so clear, With a luster […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[82,3,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4078","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-issue-58-archive","category-main","category-poetry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4078"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4078\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4086,"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4078\/revisions\/4086"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.heroicfantasyquarterly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}