13

 

my eyes

crisp
from the
day’s
sun

from
devastation’s
fires

from
cruel vision
of
relentless
horror

scorched
by
vicious
awareness
of
sentenced
gaze

take refuge
in this
heavy
late evening
dew

settling
like a
shroud

diaphanous

opaque

obscuring

I am
sustained
by this
damp
cool
pall

that
descends
upon me

wraps ‘round
my
pained
countenance

fevered
with fatigue

crippled
with despair

driven
by a
faint
memory
of honor

of duty

of
human dignity

I
stumble

broken
by
this sin
I
shoulder

this
perversion

not of
my
making

but
of my
charge

my sin

conceived
and
unleashed
by those
who
would
impose
their will

their
twisted
utopic vision

who would
advance
their agenda
of
domination

those
who
would
take it

all

who would
rule
the world

a world
now
broken

corrupted
by their
vision

spoiled
by their
vanity

a world
in
chaos

I have
but
this
bloodied
ruin-riddled
highway
of
deepening
nocturne

of
dying
dreams

crushed
innocence

destruction

death

of my
duplicity

of my
guilt

of
burdened
shame

and so

I
stumble on

saturated
with
this
falling evening

with
this
drenching sorrow

slinking

in
exhausting
alert

hollow

empty

into this
coming
night

and
the
next night

and
the night
that
follows

that always
follows

captive
on this
road
of
murder

of
mounting evil

of
brutal
human
arrogance

prisoner
of
this
lost highway

seeking
forgiveness