"Cannons, Confessions, and Crimes of the Heart: The Duel of Souls" [Tolstoy’s Battlefields, Dostoevsky’s Crimes]

In the fields where cannons roar,  

Tolstoy writes of endless war—  

Men clash with steel, hearts clash with fear,  

History's weight, heavy to bear.  

Across the steppes, blood and sky,  

Kings may fall, yet men must die.  

But deeper still, the war unseen—  

The soul's own fight, cruel and keen.  

Dostoevsky whispers low,  

Of guilt that seeds, of thoughts that grow.  

Raskolnikov's dark, whispered crime,  

Echoes through the halls of time.  

Napoleon rises, then he fades,  

Just as Raskolnikov’s blade invades—  

The crime, the war, all justified,  

In minds where righteousness resides.

Yet war on battlefields will cease,  

But what of hearts, bereft of peace?  

Tolstoy’s peace, a fleeting quest,  

As nations fall, and men confess.

In Dostoevsky’s darkened shade,  

The guilt festers, debts unpaid.  

A single act, a life undone,  

The war within is never won.  

What is peace, in Tolstoy’s hand,  

But love that sweeps across the land?  

Yet in Raskolnikov’s soul we see,  

Peace cannot be found so easily.  

For both the cannon and the crime,  

Speak of wars beyond their time.  

One in blood, the other thought,  

Both reveal the souls distraught.  

So as the world still fights for grace,  

Tolstoy dreams of warm embrace.  

And Dostoevsky watches close,  

How guilt makes men their harshest foes.  

In war, in crime, in soul’s despair,  

There’s a quiet truth we share:  

The battles rage, the crimes unfold,  

Till peace, within, finds hearts of gold.