The St. Valentine Martyrs, 14th February, 2005

When planet, sun and constellation
At the time of their creation,
Gloried in their new-born gleaming splendour,
And knelt to honour their creator,
Almighty God gave all the nations land,
To men who were the work of his own hand;
But chose he for himself a corner dear
With mystery and all its beauty clear.
He named it Lebanon, his favourite domain,
A garden hung ‘twixt mountain and the plain.
For men to come He made the cedars grow
And clothed the summits with the gleaming snow.
Men and lions lay down side by side
And far above the soaring eagles cried.
As for the Lebanese, strong of build and mind,
God for this Eden chose him from mankind.
Love ruled with all the virtues and each art,
With all adornments of the human heart.
This Lebanon of welcome with its charm,
Flower of the nations, star of the early dawn,
By the plotting of the dregs of human breed
Was o’erwhelmed by a cruel, hate-filled creed,
Perverting all that’s noble in belief
And using every way of causing grief:
Destruction, rape, violence and plunder,
Looting, torture, and every means of murder.
Sister countries and guests deprived of feeling
Bathed the land in blood and left it reeling.
For thirty years they bathed the land in blood,
Bringing death to the elite, to the great and to the good.
Now by the sea on Valentine’s Day,
Feast of love and of flowers and bashful play,
A criminal hand sets fire and flame
To kill a great man of virtue and fame.
But now the Almighty returns to the place
That once he protected by His grace.
Now seeing the evil wrought in His garden
He will punish the evil without any pardon.
With the tears of the people this land has been watered,
It is red with the blood of those that were martyred.
This land of saints and scholars has been long abused
But now comes the freedom it was refused
The Phoenix relives with lustre new,
This sacred land will be ablaze with glory due.

Joseph Matar
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Translated from French: K.J.Mortimer