To find oneself at odds with gods of men,

It means to face a fate that no one can

Escape, nor comprehend in full, for they

Of flesh are not, but far in heavens stay.

Their judgements shape one’s life and death, and yet

They don a veil of rain and beastly threat,

Of wind, wildfire, quakes, and ocean waves,

For nature t h e m is — we are but its slaves.

But solace one may find in knowing that

Those aren’t common men who simply sat

On heaven’s holy thrones: they’re wise and just,

They grant us order, ethics, and entrust

Us with their own creations, parent-like,

To save us from a man-beast chaos-reich.

Our gods, both mighty and supremely pure,

Do scorn the realms in which usurpers rule;

The worlds of suffering for its own sake,

Where goodness, justice: one is brief, one — fake;

Where respite cannot be in heavens found,

But in the certainty of sword unbound;

Where might is right, yet cannot be obtained

Through work or wisdom, or by kings ordained,

For one is either mighty-born or not,

And stays birth-shackled till he lies in rot;

Where even championed warriors never feel

At peace and safe but worry that their steel

Will not forestall defeat — a maiden mere,

Who, through her life, of war stayed clear,

Can still prevail — if titan-born — through size

Alone; her posture given, offspring-wise,

To her by bonds of flesh — ancestral grace,

So that the puny know their rightful place.

A realm among such realms, of god-likeness

Decrepit — one of beings great, immense

And yet with psyches not unlike the ones

Of common men, or little forest’s sons — 

A world it is where strength supremely reigns,

And bodies made like mountains — throbbing veins

Of old-growth’s width, and vast, quick hands; and feet

That cause the earth to tremble in defeat — 

Do as they please with men, thanks to the height —

Which less than fiftieth of titan-might

Is — of their prey; and men of such a realm

in size like us are, and: we are like them.

Let fate be praised, then, that nigh every day

In highlands hidden these colossi stay,

Incurring into human dwellings not

Unless coerced by fiery, lustful thought

Or evil men who revel in the pain

And misery of fellow humans slain

In fratricide by hands of like-shaped race

That human is all but in size through space.

But what casts want in minds of theirs to kill:

A sustenance hunt? A simple game of skill?

O, nay, 'tis passion, fervor, thrilling heart 

Of mountain-men and women, for in part

Satyric souls they have, and life force do

They not in food and water find but through

Emotions and desires, and through sense

Of smell and that of touch, and thrill intense;

And when they rage, they rage like storms and quakes;

And when they love, they love like fire-lakes

For no mere man can on his own endure

A titan-woman's pure affection and allure.

As tillers toil in blackened earth and fend

Each day, enduring strifes to keep their end

Away, as doom, despair fills hearts deprived

Of hope in ways that seem to us contrived,

The mountain-born, of whom so many lead

A life with pleasure as its only creed,

Achieve the dreams of one Diogenes

Of Sinope and his wish to bring to ease

His hunger simply by the way of touch,

Through rubbing of his belly; and as such

With reciprocal rubs have mostly passed

Their days. The ecstasy of bodies vast

Makes man’s own carnal pleasures seem a farce,

A tickle, nothing more. Alone these arts

Of love feed spirits massive and their maws

In ways as yet unknown by human laws.

Throughout the regions of this realm there lives

But one great race that bladed warfare breathes

And holds its ground in face of mountain sons:

They bear the name of the Venusians.

Of thrice the height of men they reach the size,

And solely does their commonwealth comprise

Of women, female warriors strong as stone

And mighty in command. On gleaming throne

They fashioned from the skulls of men they loathe

And conquests’ spoils they sit. Sororal oath

Obliges them to keep no husband, but

Male serfs ensure their lineage is not cut.

In cities clad in stones of white, in wide

Expanses, steppes, and plains they live and pride

Themselves on their devotion to their queen

The Matriarch, a cosmic Hyperine.

In circumstances such, a man’s life seems

Devalued, for with misery it teems

And threat of death at every step of his

By hands of beings greater than he is.

And living in the shadows of not just

The titan races, but the femme-knights vast

In physique, statehood, knowledge, skill, as well

As height — a human spirit must dispel

The notion of a cosmos that subdued

Can be through will alone; erelong conclude

He subsequently might that only in

His own abhorrent acts of vice and sin

Some harmony and respite could be found…

Unless he’s seen the might and heard the sound

Of Synalea, goddess of the skies

And of the oceans, whose Hyperian size

Dismantles egos, crushes thought, demands

Obedience and devotion, and commands

Eternal worship. In return, she spares

Her faithful devotees from higher cares,

The burden of own thought, and grim, terrene

Disasters that she brings about: marine

Incursions, earthquakes, wind gusts so severe

That human cities simply disappear.

And thus downhearted humans spend their days,

Affirming through their vile, sadistic ways —

Or through submissive acts — the absolute,

Oppressive hierarchy of this brute

And unforgiving realm. It takes a toll

On minds to be imprisoned, after all,

And sentenced to a lowly life without

A gleam of hope, with ever-present doubt.

And yet there lives in forests deep and old

A people, though minute, most tough and bold.

Petite like clover stalks their limbs appear

To humans; bodies they possess of mere

A thumb of height — but what they lack in size,

They make up for in spirit and in wise

Resourcefulness; and through their cleverness

They deal with threats. They spend their days

Within arboreal chalets and dens,

Or mounting in tall grass and moss defense,

Or in their gardens, full of forest's fruit,

Or tinkering and crafting things minute.

Apart from woodland nymphs, the titans know

Of Lilleos — for that is what they go

By — not; impassable, deep bogs and vines

With toxic thorns sure constitute the signs

Of jeopardy that humans read and stay

Away from forest folk; unless as prey

They see and search for them — and in that case

The elfs fight back, prepared to die with grace.

With nature as their homeland, sword, and shield,

And ally ever-loyal, steadfast, wield

They yet another weapon by the name

Of Zeya, like the sky immense in frame;

Her strong, Hyperian will protects the wild,

Harmonious lands of green and brown. (Defiled

May they be never by imperial wars

Or violent impudence!) And if the corps

Of elfish settlers ever find the mines

That engineers of bygone dwarven kinds

Into the bedrock carved, on which the wood —

Their home — resides, the scouts discover should 

A trove forgotten: archives full of scrolls

And hoards of high machinery. In halls

Of stone great powers hidden lie in wait

To alter this realm's balance and its fate.