Passed Pawn

The way ahead is clear

With none to block your path now drawing near.

You’ve risked it all to close

The distance to the goal behind your foes.

Success will bring promotion

And greater strength to match your pure devotion

To serve your gallant king

And fight a battle fit for bards to sing.

 

But you must also know

That, win or lose, the end will bring you low,

Returning to the role

You played before the battle took its toll.

And in your next campaign,

What changes, save your own traumatic strain?

The board remains the same

As kings send pawns to prosecute their game.

 

I think this will be the final installment in this series of poems inspired by chess. A "passed pawn" is one that doesn't have any opposing pawns in its way toward the end of the board, so it has a chance of reaching the end and being promoted to a more powerful piece. In this poem, the first eight lines essentially explain that, while the second set of eight lines takes a broader view and recognizes that, in the next game, the pawn will return to its original state again. As usual, I feel like this trend has parallels in the real world...

Opening Moves

Some like to start offensively

And send their soldiers in

To break the lines aggressively

And sacrifice themselves to win,

While others wait, contentedly,

To build a strong position.

Both ways, they say, are possible,

So make your opening decision.

For me, I find preferable

The latter, though, admittedly,

The former holds its own appeal

To flame toward fortune instantly.

But I will turn a slower wheel

And flow, like water, patiently,

Until the time seems right

Perhaps to press for peace without a fight.

 

There are a lot of standard "openings" in chess, where both sides make a certain set of moves to start off the game. My sense is that these opening ideas are on a spectrum, ranging from very aggressive, where you might sacrifice something to try to attack and apply pressure more quickly, to slower and more positional, where you build up a solid, well-defended structure of pieces. The slower, less aggressive varieties tend to feel more comfortable for me. Of course, I think these ways of starting the game have parallels to the ways in which we approach life.

Knights

They leap from light to dark, and back to light,

Unhindered by the walls that block their way.

Their movements seem to go askew and stray

From other pieces’ patterns. Every knight

Maneuvers round the structures of the game

With incremental progress, left, then right,

Until it finds a place to ease the plight

Of all whose movements fail to fit the frame

Defined by what is typical for most.

Its skilled maneuvers push aside the shame

And show its quality, of course the same

As others on the board. And so, the host

Accepts the ones they’d shunned until today,

But none should need to prove such worth to play.

 

This is the second poem in a series inspired by chess. Last week, we focused on bishops, and this week, we're focusing on knights. To me, knights have always felt a bit like the misfit among the chess pieces, because their movement pattern is so different - one square forward, backward, left, or right, then one square diagonally. Plus, they can jump over pieces that are in their way. They can't move as far or strike as quickly as others like bishops, rooks, or queens, but they can be very maneuverable and useful. This poem essentially uses knights as a metaphor for those who may be outcast by society, emphasizing that they have something valuable to offer and should be included along with everyone else.

Bishops

The only pieces who only see

Half of the entire board,

And only when they both are free

Can every tile be, by them, explored.

 

The light, the dark – each has its squares,

And sometimes one is more involved

As kings conduct their grand affairs

In turns, until the conflict stands resolved.

 

Although the bishops seem unique

Among the pieces in the game,

They might be most like us, who peek

At glimpses of the whole, with none the same.

 

Only when combined, our stories

Illuminate this world’s greater glories.

 

One of the things I like to do for fun is play chess, and I often feel like that game has a lot to say about life. This is the first of at least a few poems I'm going to share that is inspired by chess and its pieces. If you're less familiar with the game, bishops are only able to move diagonally across the chess board, which is made up of alternating light and dark squares, so these pieces are only ever able to access squares of a single color. Kind of like us, as our perspectives of the world are limited by our own experiences...