Traps

Traps

The books call this an igneous province,
As if a country of lava –
They also call these rocks an intrusion,
So more of an empire, rather.
But due to the terraces up the plateau,
They mostly call them traps –
Like a very slow escalator,
Till the warring flanks collapse.
Or are they prisoners to their nature,
Locked beneath the land ?
Heaving, layering, underpinning,
Raising mountains out of sand,
Pushing-up from underneath
By stealth or by explosion,
To reinforce the battle
With the forces of erosion.
The books call these the flood basalts
That roll across the shield
Unstoppable, a stony horde
That sweep the battlefield.