How's your heart,
If your heart was a tank of gasoline?
Is it full of rich, high octane jet fuel?
Or is it sputtering,
With only the dregs of several month old junk at the bottom?
Filled with iron oxide sediment and dirt?

The door swing violently on hinges,
Being slammed open from my hurried retreat,
Breath burning in my lung from a headlong sprint,
Running from pain and rejection,
Running from potential jeers and slants made against me.

You weren't strong enough,
You weren't fast enough,
Why didn't you see it sooner,
WHY DIDN'T YOU SAVE HIM?!?

Tears streaming from eyes burning in shame,
Feet hurting from the force of being slapped bare against asphalt,
As the road gives way to grass.

You could have been better,
You could have done more,
Why didn't you see it sooner,
WHY DIDN'T YOU SAVE HIM!?!

Blood dripping from nails digging into palms,
Vision tunneling,
Head light,
Self hatred building.

I wasn't kind enough,
I wasn't there in time,
Why didn't I see it sooner,
WHY DIDN'T I SAVE HIM?

....

Legs give as muscles cramp,
Vision slowly returns,
Finding myself alone in the woods,
Silence blankets all around.

Breath returns to normal,
And sense finally returns,
The cutting words still gnawing in the background,
Should have never given them a chance to get a foothold.

Slowly returning,
Plodding steps sending up twinges of pain from raw bare feet,
Returning to the normal world.

She walks through a once destroyed field,
Bare feet slipping through tall grass upon this warm and clear summer day,
A place once filled with shattered rifle and hewn shield,
Crater-filled like the surface of the moon,
Now but small divots from where artillery shells were sent their way.

Her hair the color of spun gold and copper,
Looks out upon the grave of equipment and limbs,
Overgrown with wildflowers and sapling acting as shims,
Filling the spaces where corpses were dropped where men once stood,
Stood tall and proud for the sake of honor.

Green eyes flecked with silver,
Peer into both present and past,
Looking out upon both abject horror and utter beauty,
At ghosts long past and young men,
Looking into eyes filled with dread and deadness one moment,
And the next with exuberance and naivety.

Step by step she crosses these hill filled plains,
Teaming with life,
Where once not even the rats could survive.

Gentle breeze kisses her cheek,
Where once it would have been blistered by gas,
An elemental force providing a cooling sensation,
Once upon a time it would have been nothing but burning and fire.

Bees lazily drift across the visage,
Where once it would have been bullets,
And at this she freezes and her heart breaks,
Looking at what she sees.

In this duality she sees a young man,
Crying and clenching at his chest,
Laying in one of the small divots that adorn the land,
And at the same time she sees only a skeleton adorned in tattered cloth,
Still in silent in the final sleep.
She crouches down beside the boy/skeleton and gently caresses his cheek,
At this the boy looks up and stops his shrieks,
Gazing upon this angel in a land where not even the devil would tread.

A ghost of a smile graces his lips,
As a dulling takes place in his eyes,
The pulsing blood slows and stops,
And the specter of explosions slowly fade to wind through the grass once again.

She stands,
And continues on her way,
Witness to a hell made heaven,
In a field of France on a summer day.

Gentle brushes upon a strong back,
Clouds of dirt going airborne with each pass,
A metaphorical cleansing of my own soul parallels the cleaning of the coat.

Gentle eyes that peer past barriers,
Caring not for the ****** past that is seen behind the walls,
But instead focusing on the soul that built them,
Perhaps there's some good there?

Scraping muck and awful from ***** hooves,
Shedding spiritual mud and dirt from crevices in my heart,
Making it lighter with each pass.

Tack is put on,
The gentle creak of leather and tinkling of metal buckles and clasps,
Tightening down violent thoughts and keeping them secured.

Bit gently slipped in,
Caring being taken to ensure a comfortable fit,
Control being given back to my life.

A step into a stirrup and with a swing of a leg being settled upon the back of this beautiful creature,
Ears tilted back,
Listening to her rider.

Peace,
Contentment,
Healing.

When we talked today,
You called me a bear,
Some hulking beast that could scare away the dangers of the world,
But behind your eyes I could see what you wanted to also say,
That I would also try and scare away the rest of the world at large,
To lumber through the forest alone,
So that I could not be hurt by anything ever again.

I saw that hurt in your eyes,
That while as this great beast I would fight and die for those I love,
My isolation would always make this number always too small.

I see you too though,
For if I am a bear, you are a hawk,
Flying in the sky so far above.

Your ability to see so much so clearly with but a glance nearly scares me,
But your cries are welcome all the same,
Giving warning of the dangers that I cannot see,
I rely on your honest calls to keep from wandering through these woods belligerently,
Giving me a cooler perspective,
Calming the storms in my heart and in my head.

But little hawk,
Do you not isolate yourself too?
Where my self-imposed exile is in the trees and mountains,
Is yours not in the sky and clouds?
Your high perch gives you sight for miles,
But none can reach you there.

I know you don't mean to,
And perhaps I read too much into this metaphor,
But my offer will forever stand,
Remember to swoop down and visit this simple bear every once and a while,
And I will endeavor to join you in the blue skies whenever I can.

The Södenberg sisters sing to me tonight,
Their words sending me far from this slightly cold balcony,
To a realm of asphalt and dusty wind.

For my first 10 years there were no roads,
But a plethora of paths,
Criss crossing,
Winding to and fro,
Foot beaten little things in a great forest,
Filled with trees, creeks, waterfalls, and animals,
Birds singing beautiful songs as they sail through the trees,
Squirrels chattering from their perches amongst the great branches,
Whitetails observing my progress of the child .

As a young boy I'd sprint down these paths,
Unheeding of the odd roots that were placed along the paths,
So happy to just be moving forward,
To see what played around the next bend.

The next 10 years were simple things,
A two lane town road,
Buildings of my hometown on lined either side,
Their facades as they were,
Before the place of my forefathers got too big too fast,
Where all it's citizens knew my parents,
And by extention, me,
The birds and squirrels still there,
Although their number greatly diminished.

My pace was greatly diminished,
No longer some great sprint,
But a gentle jog,
Taking in the familiar sites,
But excited to leave this place,
Impatient for a change of scenery and anticipating some great adventure.

The next 3 were a treacherous yet exciting road,
A winding mountain pass,
Steep sloaped and lined with switchbacks,
Giving beautiful mountain vista views,
But with this new road also came the realization,
That the road could be a dangerous thing,
One slip could give way to a great fall,
The once gentle jog gave way to a cautious walk,
Wary of foot placement and step,
No birds here,
No squirrels,
But instead of the rumble of far off thunder,
And the howling of distant wolves.

Then came the next four,
The thunder no longer far off,
The wolf howls no longer distant,
The asphalt cracked and split,
Closed in on both sides by a thick and menacing wood,
And through the darkness of the nearly moonless night the darting shapes of beasts could be seen.

Rain slashing down,
Galing winds battering me,
My body worn down,
My walk but a limp,
Taking my broken self forward,
One dragging step after another,
A constant struggle to find the energy to make it one step further,
To find reason to keep going.

But like some great magic trick the wooding cleared,
The rain stopped,
And the wolves pulled back.

It was here that I found you next to me.

This new road is a bit cracked,
A bit disused,
The desert beautiful with Mesas to either side,
My pace quickened,
No longer a slogging trudging thing,
But also not a run,
A relaxing stride that feels good and steady,
Churning onward to the mountains in the distance.

I look to you and you smile,
You smile back,
And it is here that I see hawks up above,
A fox to the far right,
Observing these travelers passing through it's lands.

No longer an unlined face,
Bearded and festooned with a smattering of scars,
Earned through foolish fights and terrible tumbles,
But gladly won and worn all the same,
Sun kissed skin taking in the pleasant warm arid air.

I know not where this road leads,
But the excitement returns once more,
And that I no longer need to travel it alone,
That traveling is never meant to be done all on one's own,
That it's the company that makes the trip worth it.

With that the duo's song ends,
And I am transported back to this balcony,
The air still clung to with the slipping grasp of winter's last vestiges,
And it's begrudging release so close at hand,
Bring forward new beginnings,
And new roads to be traversed.

Oh Gygax,
If you could see what you've made,
What it's become,
To those you've touched,
With simple dice, paper, and pen,
You'd see a community you've helped,
A people inspired,
Of joys you bring everyday.

You introduce to some a world of creativeness,
Of fantasy and dragon slaying,
To others you've helped provide a creative outlet,
Something they thought they'd never have again.

You've helped people make friends,
Some lifelong,
Connecting them in various ways,
But through it all,
It will have all started,
With a 20 sided dice,
And a simple question;
"Would you like to play?"

You've helped some through some rather dark and rough patches,
A form of escapism that can't compare,
To others you've provided a fun weekly activity,
To decompress from the toils of the day-to-day.

From the starry eyes of our most youthful,
To the slightly hazy eyes of old,
Entertainment you've brought to us,
From your average joes,
To famous folk,
The touch of your creation enraptures all that it beholds.

My friends and I gather again,
On this Friday night,
To fight zombie hoards, Kobold warlords,
Even a Black pudding or two,
And for a little while,
In those fleeting instants,
They're great hero's of Valara and Altour.

So thank you Gygax,
for all you've done,
as we sit down at this table,
from the noble adventuring group known as the Assless Chaps,
(Exasperated Sigh)
And their beleaguered Dungeon Master.