Barren, the earth beckons
Sole pair of feet treading in heat.
Respite is seldom found while
Dread, exhaustion and sweat are cheap.
Burnt heather, ashes for a bed,
A pillow of dead feathers.
What else must he do to rest
Save be abed in dust, the traveller.

A fall, showering of the abandoned
Leaves, children so dried.
Lifelessly dropping, hopeless,
From clutches of the mother tree, pried.
Poison intoxicating, sapping nature
And all there is, it's fallen bounty.
To seek rest amidst the fallen
In itself is not devoid of folly.

Spines, shivering in deathly embrace
Of ice and of all that is cold.
Paralysis of a different nature
Body begging for warmth lost and old.
Silence embalms the wild
The tame are shown no mercy.
For who dare put his eyes to rest
They may never again open, never see.

A beautiful ethereal death awaits
Those lulled by false enchantments.
Songs and whispers of ivy and moss
Trap innocents at river embankments.
Fruit and flower, vines and willows,
Dryads of the woods, deepening magic.
Slumber means to never stand again,
Death in solemn sleep, of course is tragic.

Do not die before me.
Sweet one, I beg and I plead.
  For what is not a whole,
  May never be complete.

Mother superior,
****** nurturer of a planted seed.
Embalming growth,
Reaped the fruit with an eyeful of dreams.
  Eternal gardener,
You have raised this fruit to a whole.
Life giver,
It has grown plump flesh and soul.
  Mother love,
I am what I was brought here to be.
Fear not,
For above all, your son I will be.
  Till death,
You will wish for your son to live on.
Need not,
For in life itself your name I will carry on.
  Mother believe,
Your lap has been my throne.
Choices gallore,
But I'd rather be with you, home.
Worry less,
Mother your boy will be a man.
Listen here,
He will always be there till the end.

Well worn, this path we tread;
a myriad kaleidoscope of gravel.
The darkest corner beyond the wall,
moonlit shadows concealing our travel.
  Let them fall, shed ****** tears, Mary incarnate,
moist the soil, so I may sow the now growing seed;
of Envy, Wrath of Pride such,
of Lust, Hubris and of Greed.
  Fine welts of nimble fingers,
reddening the newborn scratches on my chest.
If aware that intimacy is paid with blood,
I never would have touched your waist.
  A reflex, a conditional response,
is what I deem it to be.
Servility shown is wasted, for
pride cannot bow further, when already on bent knees.
  Disdain, distaste and disgust over
the fingerprints on your ****** skin.
Wipe away the invisible marks
with your sleeves as if they had never been.
  You step away, stomach churning,
at my sight; a black mass of acid.
Dripping hurt, sadness and unjustified desire,
the less cold-hearted might call me placid.
  Before inevitable departure, screaming obscenities,
at the burns I caused on your flesh,
allow me to separate your beliefs
from lies and follies caught in a mesh.
  Years I have ****** the venom,
burning my own, now charred heart.
Blackened, destroyed limbs and face,
if you remember ma cherie, I was flesh at the start.
  Nevermind though, how I became,
what I am forced to be.
Little lover of mine, stay away please,
before you burn in my acid intimacy.

Step here in my shoes
Walk where these feet have been at
You will reach your Home