Passion Play (Unbroken Suite)

The original version of Passion Play, titled Playwrite, has been published in All of Me Vol. V, courtesy of Shadow Spark Publishing. Featured art is by Karol Bąk.

Listen to Passion Play by Richard Charles Stevens (Unbroken Suite)

Listen to For The Unbroken by Ace Buchannon

The world’s a stage
A passion play
Where harp-strings praise
Impassioned braves
Gallant knights ride satin waves
And fashion ways to rise
The world’s a coliseum
The arena of Athena
Seen anew through tears
Wept ashen grey
That saturate the eyes
.
In midst of marble palisade
Neath marvel of the skies
The slain are seen to graduate
From battle-scarred demise
The blood runs red in rivulets
Yet still requests continuance
The crowd proclaim Odysseus
Most vitreous of eye
I die you die
Claims the brave
To their innate delight
Indeed they only came here and remain here for a fight
And this is why I aim sky high to celebrate free flight
This is why I aim sky high to celebrate free flight
.
There are kings and there are queens
There are hopes that cling to dreams
There are open hearts unseamed
To be spoken in reprise
There are reasons to proceed
Fairer seasons when agreed
In allegiance with belief
That we are only meant to rise
.
The world’s a quiet place
In brace of time and space aside
Undressed of vocal context
Bears no heft of weight applied
Silent on address of those disposed of faith—Capacious minds
Exposed to vacant nature of the blight
.
The world is ours to claim our place
Flame inside our clay to shape
Eyes our own remain that way
Until we see the gains outweighed
The world’s a stage
A passion play
Off-Broadway it may be
But how long is a length of string
When stretched across the sea
.
The world’s a stage
A passion play
Where harp-strings praise
Impassioned braves
Gallant knights ride satin waves
And fashion ways to rise
The world’s a coliseum
The arena of Athena
Seen anew through tears
Wept ashen grey
That saturate the eyes
.
Who’s to say the best that we can be
Ourselves aside
For only we can tell our tales
Compel the waves to rise
And only we can see the world
Through celebrated eyes
Only we can see the world
Through celebrated eyes
.
The world’s a stage
A passion play
Where harp-strings praise
Impassioned braves
Gallant knights ride satin waves
And fashion ways to rise
The world’s a coliseum
The arena of Athena
Seen anew through tears
Wept ashen grey
That saturate the eyes
.
In midst of marble palisade
Neath marvel of the skies
The slain are seen to graduate
From battle-scarred demise
Not a reign be overthrown
Of no bestowed decline
Reposed in cadent savour of delight
Reposed in cadent savour of delight
.