All of the poems in this story are taken from my Mass Effect poetic epic "The Song of the Shepard". The whole thing can be found on my Website (Of Stars and Ships and Meadows Green), but this is for those who prefer one-shots and short poetry.

The poem below is from 'The Citadel' second Canto of The Song. The starship Normandy is travelling to speak with the highest interspecies Council about the attack on a colony ... and about the strange ship which brought the attackers.


The Normandy's swift, far swifter than light.
On our own drive core we outpace in flight,
The beams of the stars, the Milkyway's blaze
We leave them behind and fly past their rays.
She takes the final mass relay
But days from the battle, though so far away.
We burst on vista of lavender light.
The great Serpent Nebula's glowing alight
With the blazing of stars in their infancy
Young starlets and white, old vapours and bright
Radiant purple transparency.
Wreathed in the mists of this wavering cloud
Floats a vast silver structure, ancient and proud.
From a huge central ring, five wings fly out
Long, smooth, and curved, revolving about.
We skim through the billows, plunge through the veils
Towards this, the Citadel, rich of old tales.
From the Bridge where I, with my ground team, stand,
Prepared to disembark, as soon as we land,
I see the vast arms sliding by, ships in flight,
And one mammoth vessel of beauty and might,
A fleck beside it, is the Normandy
A gnat beside a monarch of the sea.
'Look at that monster!'
Williams cries
A light of delight shining bright in her eyes.
'She's the Ascension. Asari flagship.'
Alenko supplies. I hear Joker quip
Something about its guns and its size.
But I see she is graceful, like our fair allies.
Yet she's nothing like so large, not nearly,
As was the dark shape which hung over the valley.

We dock aboard the Presidium Ring
And walk among trees and fountains that sing.
Its like a deep canyon; a lake runs below
And above, the young sun-stars shine white as snow.
Along leafy terraces and through lofty halls,
Anderson leads us three, past waterfalls.
Around us are Turians, fierce and tall
The froggy Salarians, lithe and small
Asari star-women, blue and fair
And aliens stranger – their sounds fill the air.