Vigil

I fell asleep today, after many and many years

of being away.

Out in a place I didn’t know

but I wasn’t scared, no, I wasn’t alone.

There was fire, and faces unknown

but I wasn’t scared, no, I wasn’t alone.

Black rivers and burning skies

promising nothing, only lies;

there was darkness, the screaming had grown

but I wasn’t scared, no, I wasn’t alone.

The skies were dark, and my sight grew dim. Roads of fire, and blood too thick to swim;

you see, bodies were lying all over the ground

telling me to go, leave before drowned.

Instead of the voices, the words came out as dust –

only the screaming, vanished into the rust;

I had a hand I held like gold

and the hand was warm, and, believed, so old;

It led me through these roads of fire

and I never looked at it, let alone higher.

Thought it was someone who cared

I thought it was someone who wasn’t scared;

I faded out within their cries,

touched their bodies, bones and eyes;

only skin hung, no flesh to give,

as they yelled out

„you can run but you can’t leave“

Photo: HendrixEesti / Wikimedia Commons

Stones of fire started falling

from tall blood skies, they came down rolling

on the backs of bodies

already burned

sinking in their bones

the madness had returned.

And there were shadows, human beings out once

hovering over above our hands and minds;

They were soon all around us on the fiery stone

and I was then scared, because I wasn’t alone.

The hand, it became much warmer than it was

once we got to these gates; crier of black jaws.

I frowned, I gasped, I looked at the hand

seeing it was someone leading me to the end;

The hand was nothing more but a ghost,

a thick, black mass

attached to a shadow,

a messenger for us to pass.

They called them ’The Grays’’, the shadows of death,

the ones who take souls along their final breath.

I tried to pull my weakened palm,

but it was numb- the blood becalmed.

The tips of my fingers

were black as the night

and they were promised

to another eternal light.

The light of the fire, the light of the demons,

the light of the sadness and two only seasons.

I felt my meaning, aura of the mind –

being drained like nothing, and sold to the weak and the blind;

A circle of light, the only one in the mist

Began to shine as darkness rose higher, above my wrist.

’Twas the soul they took - out of my chest and out for the poor,

I was soon as dark as my leader, my raconteur.

Soon, no hand held mine and I was free

but when I looked around

my own self was no longer me.

I was weak, and empty and drained,

left abandoned, strangled and chained

by the fire and by the night,

by the stones and blood in sight.

Only a black soul that hovers around;

I belong here, now, I belong to this ground.

I, too, cry, when I see the mortals.

I tell them the same I’ve been told at the portals

„You can run but you can’t leave“,

you have a soul and it’s a soul you need to give.

I too am now made of skin and no flesh –

stones fall too, on my bare back for bones to enmesh.

Shh..

There..

There, it hovers, a body so perfect,

asleep and healthy, but filthy under the surface.

She soon fell, and woke up at once

as the fire rose, and stones began to bounce.

I took her hand, and she never looked at me

She felt safe and never asked „where you are taking me?“

We walked upon the roads of blood,

and skies began to burn –

She gazed at the dying ones

But she never did return.

I saw myself, so much in her eyes,

but it was known all along, she’s the one who dies.

Clinging to my hand, and giving me trust

But she was dirty from the sins, the vices and lust.

Soon, we were at the gates, and I could feel our fire,

When she was in pain – I became the liar.

She passed, she became,

what I’ve become today

And then I was a messenger, I am now the Gray.

#creativewriting