A ROMAN PLAGUE
A plague ate its hungry fill
of Dura’s mighty Roman ranks,
drowned too Italcus, whose red river banks
saw no more Romans left to kill
The tempest she had a name
Some named her Cacus, the fire-spitter
others the serpent and witch
But these titles? Too meagre to give her
For a woman so named
Could ne’er own eyes so wise
so righteous
so beautiful
- Song of Joy
Persia, circa 256 – 57 AD
“Dura-Europos has fallen, brothers. The Persians own the city.”
The Legionnaires of the colonia, Italcus, listened raptly and with grave features to their fellow soldiers standing before them, weary and wounded from the bloodshed they’d left behind. These three men were survivors of the sacking, defeat defining their postures, shame in their eyes.
“The Sassanids are desert devils
