Author's note: Hello, everyone! For those of you who don't know me, I am TriChronos and I enjoy writing extremely long author's notes (they do contain vital information so please continue reading). For those of you who do know me, I assume you checked this out after reading my original fic, "The Seal of Time and the Triforce of Eterninty". If so, thank you, if not, please check that out.
Now, I would like to present you all with this new venture I am taking into the world of poetry and, before any poetry buffs decide to get on my case:
-I have no formal training in the poetic arts, save for a few romps in past English classes when I was in high school
-I don't particularly care about the overall structure of a poem. If it sounds good and flows well, I like it
-I like poems that rhyme. I know they don't have to, but I think it takes quite a bit of skill to make everything rhyme AND make sense
Ok, I think that pretty much covers it. Overall, this poem contains an AABB rhyme scheme and ALMOST all of the word pairs rhyme directly. Some of them rhyme in the Shakespearean sense of rhyming where, if you twist the word ever-so slightly, it will rhyme.
This is, more or less, a poetic story that will travel over three different chapters. It takes place at the end of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time during the final battle...
(SPOILER ALERT!!! If you have not finished Ocarina of Time, and don't want to know how it ends, I suggest you go finish it and then come back to read this...END SPOILER!!!)
...with Gannondorf (or Ganon...it's almost interchangable within the poem, but I like to think it's against Gannondorf). This answers the question of what happens when you, as the player, get a game over screen. You can restart the game, but what would be happening within the confines of the game itself? What would the characters be doing? Most importantly, what would they be thinking?
Part one, Shattered Love, focuses on Zelda. It is VERY zelink, just to warn you and, at least to me, it is extremely sad. I think most other zelda fan will also find this strongly emotion stirring.
Now, as I have said, I might be updating this with more chapters (this poem may also get some extra verses if I think of any, but it is unlikely), depending on the response I get from you, the readers. After you finish, I strongly suggest posting a review of your thoughts. If the results are less than stellar, I will be discontinuing the series, which I don't want to do seeing as there are still two other characters that need to tell their stories. Hopefully the results will be good and I can start writing the other two poems.
Well, I guess that's enough long windedness for me. Please enjoy, The Hero's End...
The Hero's End
Shattered Love
For many a while I've watched him try
To take on the world and problems nigh.
His heart, so pure and full of might
My strength with him when he did fight.
I prayed for him, his safety stay,
Yet pain was his along the way.
Battered, bruised and broken, he
Fought for all of us...including me.
Yet all the dodging he could do
Could not stem the injuries he'd accrue.
I watched in horror, sometimes in fright,
Wondering if he'd come back that night.
Whispering secret prayers for him
And those he sought to now reclaim.
His journeys fraught with endless pains
Now converging into shames.
A journey to save so many now,
Is brought upon his sweating brow.
For, in the past, day to day,
He made many happy along his way.
They would stop and wave, perhaps a cheer
But nary should you hear a jeer,
For the man who stands here now, this night,
Is a hero trying to change our plight.
From the starting point of his mission then
He knew the risks that would plague his plan,
The monsters he would have to face,
Yet he always put them in their place.
The light his aura would produce
Brought his enemies to the noose.
But now that light has begun to fade.
His smile now marred by blood and blade.
His hair, once soft, reflecting light,
Now stands down upon his sight.
I stand at his side, without a word,
Wondering if he hadn't heard
The words I spoke a time before
To be cautious, not let his emotions soar
With the hatred I could, by now, tell,
For his enemy he'd like to kill.
He raises his blade above his head,
A sign that he now wants him dead.
Yet strength alone shall not win the fight.
He rushes anyway, into the night.
I see strikes of steel, sparks of light,
I stand here with my fists clenched tight.
I dare not breath, nor speak a word
Lest his mind be thrown and his body skewered
I hear cries of pain and calls of fright
As my heart sinks into this blackened night,
For my fears, now, have just begun…
I cannot think he hasn't won.
I run into the mist, the darkened world
The place into which, himself, he hurled
With thoughts of hope and dreams of light,
But not enough to fill his sight.
I run to where the cries are dispensed
With no more than hope entrenched
Within my heart, I hope and pray
His life, inside of him, will stay.
I hope that when I get to him
His enemy will lay there, slain.
Instead of his blood lying there
His enemy's be everywhere.
Yet once my gaze meets the sight
I have nothing in my heart but fright.
To his side I do now kneel.
The flesh of his chest now does peel
Away from the bone under its weight,
Cut a line that's perfectly straight.
My sight floats up to something there
A figure that now locks a stare
Upon me and begins to laugh
In an evil way, a violent chaff,
But nothing is there that I can do
To stop the blood, now flowing through,
Upon my hands and on my dress
Draining from his open flesh.
He tries to speak, saying things
Through fresh blood his wound now brings
But croaks are all that I can hear.
Within his eye now forms a tear.
I think back, now, to a better time
When we knew not of this horrible crime
That was to befall the people here
When we knew not of this terrible fear,
But no amount of wish or hope
Can save us from this steepening slope
That we have climbed since that time back then
With hope fading into black again.
His words can nary make a sound,
Into his blood they seem to drown,
With no regard for his failing life
Strung out upon his enemy's knife.
What shall I do, can I heal him now?
Is there no way to disavow,
This mission that we both took
Not knowing the danger that has now shook
My confidence in our strength and plan
Our goals and journey…a horrible sham.
His breathing is now labored still,
Each breath a struggle for his lungs to fill.
His life draining fast upon the ground
There is no cure, at all, around.
His enemy laughs with triumph now
As I wipe the sweat from his crumpled brow.
My hero whispers to me a sad lament
Of his foolish and foolhardy attempt
To regain the peace of this broken land
With nothing but his sword in hand.
He tells to me of his hopes and dreams,
Now, all tearing at the seams,
His life now fading into black,
His grip, once tight, now giving slack,
His eyes, once blue and shining bright
Fall to his wounds and lose their light.
Now the end, for him, has come.
His journey is now over and done.
This land shall fall to evil hands
That shall serve his foul demands
For I have no strength left to fight
And my hero's spirit will soon take flight.
With no one left to defend this day
The vile one will win and stay
Upon his throne of many a corpse,
My people he killed in many sorts.
Now my heart begins to sink.
Everything gone in a single blink.
Evil spreading across my once proud earth
The will of the people, now in dearth.
Is there no one left to save this day?
A hero around to show us the way?
There was one once, but his life is gone
Snuffed out before his time was done.
My mind comes back to the battle here
My hero's eyes now showing fear,
As the reaper closes in on him
No way to fight and live again.
At his side I hold his hand,
Brushing away a bloody strand
Of hair that's gotten in the way
Of the face I wish would live and stay
At my side forevermore
But soon will his spirit soar.
With all the strength that he has left
He pulls me to his bloodied chest
An embrace, to me, so bittersweet
A moment that seems too fast and fleet
His arms loosen and then give way,
Nothing left to make him stay.
His life escaping through his wound
Becoming sand upon an endless dune
That I can't find, nor replace
As the color fades from his face.
The final moment has only to arrive
The evil man will now soon thrive
And my hero's life be lost to the wind
And, in its place, nothing but sin.
His final words to me are brief
His mind soon to reach relief.
He tells me of a shattered love
That he has caused to an angel above
Who thought only of him from morn till night
Who watched him out of love and fright
For his safety, wishing he would stay,
And treating his wounds along the way
And guiding him upon the path of light
And worrying, with him, of this lands plight
And giving him the strength to try
To change the world and problems nigh
That caused him an injury or two
That she couldn't stop him from accrue
For his dodge, tonight, was slow and lame
Leading to this awful shame.
He could not save this wondrous land
And bring it back to peace again.
With an apology and one final kiss,
Something that should have caused me bliss,
Now lets his spirit pass away
Into the dark that's won the day.
My hero, now limp, goes to rest,
From the wound placed upon his chest.
His life fades away and his body dies
As nothing but tears fall from my eyes.
