Martyr: Clarion, Shine, and Chime

The sole of the boot
approaching your face.
The air compressing
ahead of its arrival,
a wave of dim purple,
red, blue, diffuse.

What you want to say
to the power about to smash you
into the dirt won’t come out
of your mouth. You push 
hard, try to unclench; 
nothing. The air turns
to pure and solid shadow, 
then to hard leather, then
to explosion, red
and blurring. You still
have something to say
but are not sure it will be 
understood or heard now.
You choke it down though
you can still hear it, your clarion
and shine and chime.

Again it comes:
your clarion, shine, and chime.
Someone is crying it out.
Someone will triumph
where you did not. Someone
will rise from this same dirt
and remember you,

you who did not cry out
because you could not, and
you will not die.