After Cambreadth
words © 1995 John C. Bunnell
music: Heather Alexander (“March of Cambreadth”)
The original song to which this one replies is legendary in the filk world for generating energetic sing-alongs and overwhelming recalcitrant hotel management into submission. But at root it’s a martial number and a prelude to battle, which prompted me to write the lyric about what happens afterward.
Vultures cry, cloth turns red; voices moan among the dead;
“Medic here!” comes the fevered cry, though no soldier fears to die;
Surgeon’s steel, seared white-hot, burns out poison, cuts out rot;
To the gods our oath we give:
How many of them can we make live?
To the bloody tents they come; silent now the horn and drum;
Slashed and maimed in the heat of war, ours the duty to restore;
Wood and leather, flesh and steel — that which kills may also heal;
Hands and hearts and skills we give:
How many of them can we make live?
Through the evening, through the night, by the moon, by torch’s light;
Battle joined on another field, Death itself called on to yield;
Bodies we can make half-whole; someone else must patch each soul;
What we can is what we give:
How many of them can we make live?
Shattered bodies, shattered lives, yet the will to live survives;
Our fight ends, but the world goes on; twilight yields the sky to dawn;
Herb-wife’s wares and surgeon’s skill, on the wounded work their will;
This is all that we can give:
How many of them can we make live?
