Same Grubs in Better Armor

History told as a series
Of wars, civil wars, and dates
Of battles and short-lived kings

Often assassinated
By friends or family members
Is both wearisome and boring.

A chronology can cover
Centuries, a millennium,
With nothing getting better long.

Only introduced inventions
Ever rattle the succession.
Sometimes large religious movements,

People pouring in from elsewhere,
Or the arrival of a plague
Can change dramatis personae,

But the cycle recommences
With succeeding wars and rulers,
Conquests, internal divisions.

If it weren’t for the retention
Of new tricks of technology
As people found them, history

Wouldn’t ever change. Then again,
History, including weapons
And pens, began as inventions.