The Road

“The Road”

I want to sleep…it’s something to feel…
There is a road, untraveled, that I conceal
In the space between dreams and twilight
Between the towers and cities of the night,
Forgotten cities, now forbidden and dead
With pendulous shrouds that hang overhead.

It is a place of which few men speak,
But which all men are doomed to seek.
I stepped early into that land of demise,
With the lonely tears in my eyes
To see the flowers wither,
And hear the winds of time whisper,
Of when the sky of yore was blue,
While above there is no Heaven,
Each dying soul in agony is given
To the blossoms that they may wilt anew:
Endlessly swaying, decaying ever
On The Road that stretches forever.

Early I stepped into that land
Guided by a withering hand,
A dying child, with eyes filled with tears,
Among the graves and through the years
Led me, permitting me not to stray
From the flowers that mark the way.
As we traveled, I noticed the petals whiten,
The way ahead appeared to brighten,
But The Road did not end—it was only sleep.
I heard the dying child weep,
And I beheld what defilement lay ahead—
I fell to my knees and wept,
Praying that I only slept
When I looked upon the newly dead
As, at my side, the child died
And I realized I was the child’s reaper,
And that child was the sleeper.

© 2022 Marten Hoyle