Joan of Arc

I was raised by a martyr;
A figure blackened and burning at the stake.
Calling out in her agony-remember me! Yes, I remember you-
I remember how you tied your own hands behind your back
And spit fire at my feet, but it caught you instead.
You are dying for a cause, for which there is no cause.
A cautionary tale.

Your last gift to me before the stake was a rope,
So that I might follow your noble path, but I see nothing noble
In the smell of charred flesh, in self-inflicted wounds,
In the sacrifice of senseless youth-
I will not sing from the gallows-
I will not burn myself to death.