The Mystic’s Recollection

 

By Fionn’s table, the Traveller sat

In dreams, though not his own

To gaze below on a tortured land

Of brick and barn and bone,

Where he thought sad thoughts,

It was all he had,

A burden carried sore

That anchored deep

The days passed by

When afflicted cried ‘no more’.

 

He watched them as they wept by stream

And cradled bloody heads

Or creased in pains of hunger forced

In joyless, sodden beds.

He saw the terror spring to life in empty, haunted eyes

And sickened as the crows swept down

To feed, from cruel skies.

 

He cringed as every scream rang forth

From small unblinking souls

And plugged his ears against the din

That seeped from bodies cold.

He hugged himself and lay, in dark,

As issue boots clumped by,

The cloven hooves of demon men

With souls both black and dry.

 

Parched, he drank from muddy pool

To quench the growing pain.

He spat in horror as eyes sought out

The source of crimson stain.

He shook, he shivered, he wept depleted,

He looked to heavens high.

He begged for mercy long forgotten

To tumble forth from bloody sky.

 

Ignored again, he curled below

The hawthorn, still in bloom,

Beside the family he once had

All still now in the gloom,

To wait upon the rising sun

To warm the land and breeze,

To softly take his soul from him

And to him gift sweet peace.

 

The Traveller woke, his sweat now cold,

He shivered hard with fear

And swallowed sore the choking lump

That oft foretold a tear,

And swore out loud, a solemn vow

Of faith, the fight to come;

For terror shrinks from justice sought,

And fades in endless sun.

A.D.