Beneath The Watch Tower

 

I watch the man who sits below the oak,

his features twisted by the scars of time,

a body wrapped inside a velvet cloak

of moss, that wasn’t there back in his prime.

 

He played amid the gnawing granite teeth

that sprung from grassy gums of evergreen

and knew nothing of those who lay beneath,

but only those who, with him, danced between.

 

Then one-by-one the dancers went to bed

and left the man alone with only dreams -

or fears that simple dreams might raise the dead.

Pray tell who, in this place, would hear him scream?

 

Dead flowers hang from vases, cracked and dull,

their pretty bonnets overgrown with weeds -

whose simple aspirations tug and pull

to satisfy their parasitic needs.

 

I stand so tall and proud with stony face,

a voice left silent since the chimes of war.

I want him to be happy in this place -

not sad and bitter for what went before.

 

As twilight hides beneath a heavy cowl

of darkness, rising bleak above my spire,

the hooting of a solitary owl

snaps consciousness as taut as any wire.

 

With a world, weary sigh he stands to leave –

turning, but once, to look upon my face.

I know that with that glance he still believes

that I am God and he the Human Race.