Wars of great kings and clash of armouries
Whose swords no man could tell, whose spears
Were numerous as wheat field's ears
Rolled over all the great lands, and seas

Were loud with navies, their devouring fires
Behind the armies burned both fields and towns
And sacked and crumbled or to flaming pyres
Were cities made, where treasuries and crowns

Kings and their folk, their wives and tender maids
Were all consumed. Now silent are those courts
Ruined the towers, whose old shape slowly fades
And no feet pass beneath their broken ports