Dedicated to our troops in Iraq.....
~*~Last Night in Mordor~*~
We are nearly there.... A star peeps down upon us almost as if to check if we be all right like a mother looking in on her sleeping babes. But does she tell us now that this night is to be our last upon this earth? I cannot think on it! But here, master dear, sleep now in my arms you are cold, sick, weary, sad you should rest and recover but there's neither time nor place for it. Your eyes that once held joy and teasing lights are all glazed and shuttered, their candles dowsed. I cannot see you there behind the shattered panes only grey webbing and dusty beams. Your door is locked. But I will try my best to keep the horrid shapes away from your dreams just for tonight. Dream instead of a land that never knew the stink of ash, the savor of venom the burn of betrayal the black wings of war. Think of your feet fondled by waters cool and quick dancing on a clovered stair pillowed on ferns and silver reeds. Fruit trees bow on every slope begging for relief of their loads apples that fit the curve of your palm as though you had molded them to suit your fancy. The sun seeks out your juice-stained face through every branch to give back the light you left behind somewhere along the way. Will that land be ours, or is this all there is? I cannot think on it!
But if this small life is all there is for us we will at least be able to say we lived it well and planted seeds of healing for the punished soil we sleep beneath. White flowers will wave above our bones like little flags that say, "We guard our heroes here!" I can say I knew you, that you were dearer far than all others--save one, and perhaps no less dear, at that. We were born that those who come after never know the path that we now tread the stones that bite our feet the thirst that dries our souls we've done it all for them. Others have done as much, why can't we? Two soldiers we'll be, giving our all for those we love and those they will love. Our praises they'll sing our stories they'll savor and if there is indeed a reward for all of this (as I think there really is) we'll never part again. It's all I could wish.... and yet... I would that it didn't have to be Not this soon, anyway...............
|