THE ROAD TO OHRID Poem by Vasco Graça Moura

from the heights of the walls of ohrid
to where he'd run upon hearing the screams
of the look-outs, king samuel beheld his disfigured
army dragging through the macedonian mountains.

the eyes of the fourteen thousand men had been
gouged by order of the emperor, basil the second,
who had instructed that one eye be spared in every
hundredth man so that they could lead the return

of that blind herd. having crossed over the high snows
they now came rushing down toward the lake,
stumbling and grabbing on to one another,
the torture mirrored in their facial contortions,

blood soaking their tattered clothes, and the king,
seized by anguish, uttered a shout of grief and died
on the heights of the walls over the hill and his forests and groves
which the lake so peacefully reflected.

in that instant he understood just how ambiguous
the blind force of destiny was, and in no monastery
could the screens of icons have elucidated that cruel mystery:
the saints, whose faces resembled fayumic portraits,

remained silent in their frescos amid the flickering
flames, and the voices of the young monks,
in their austere and unyielding chant,
were lifting up a grave spring in the shadows.