The Fall of Jerusalem: A Poem

The year is 70 CE. Roman legions have encircled Jerusalem, and ancient walls prepare to meet their ruin. In this ambitious early American epic, John Church weaves together the sweeping catastrophe of Jerusalem's fall with the intimate devastation of Placidus, a young Roman soldier confronting love lost amid the brutal machinery of empire. The poem unfolds in three parts, moving from the legions' march through the siege's escalating chaos, betrayal, sacrifice, the wailing of a city in flames. Church renders the final hours with somber beauty, layering personal grief against the collapse of a civilization. What remains when walls crumble and prophecies fulfill themselves? Is it divine judgment, or simply the wreckage of human ambition? For readers drawn to early American engagements with biblical history and the terrible weight of empires, this poem traces the thin line between triumph and tragedy.