THE TERRA COTTA WARRIORS

The Long Lost Terra Cotta Warriors are Called to Battle
wodumedia.com

for Hannah's prompt at Real Toads: China: Tea Fields, Terra Cotta Warriors,  Pandas,all things Chinese. The Terra Cotta Warriors have always fascinated me, since I read Annie Dillard's description of her visit to see them, in For the Time Being.

nationalgeographic.com

Briefly, farmers digging for a well in China in 1974 uncovered a terra cotta face. On further investigation, an entire underground army of life sized terra cotta figures has been discovered, surrounding the tomb of China's first Emperor, Qin She Huang, 260-210 BC, who became Emperor  at the age of thirteen. In 210-209 BC, they were buried with him as a type of funerary art, depicting his living army, each figure individually represented. 

absolutechinatours.com

Thousands of army figures,   both cavalry and infantrymen, along with horses and chariots, have been unearthed at a depth of 23 feet, surrounding the burial tomb as far away as a kilometer and a half outwards. It is as if they were placed around the tomb to protect the Emperor in death as their live counterparts did in life. As artisans brush away the surrounding clay, they free the figures, in amazingly pristine condition after more than two thousand years underground.

lycheetravel.com

age-of-the-sage.org

They swim up out of the earth, clay warriors, 

terra cotta faces peering from red dirt,

faces astonished upon seeing light, the spark,

after centuries of living in the dark.

Terra cotta faces peering from red dirt,

a man, a horse, swim upward through the clay,

After centuries of living in the dark,

emerging as if birthed into the light of day.

A man, a horse, swim upward through the clay,

full chariots, where men and horses ride,

emerging as if birthed into the light of day,

as the artist gently brushes the soft powdery dirt away.

Full chariots, where men and horses ride,

faces astonished upon seeing  light, the spark,

as the artist gently brushes the soft powdery dirt away,

they swim up out of the earth, clay warriors, escaping from the dark.

disclaimer: this is supposed to be a pantoum, but in order to make the last line have some relevance, 
I had to add a phrase.