
“Shadow & Crown” — C.Birde, 9/19
They turned away –
she, to the left; he, the right –
and with their eyes averted,
left the boy to face his fate.
Alone.
Abandoned.
Small and pale and fragile,
he unfolded from sleepless sleep,
lifted from a woven basket
by the fireplace.
Full well he knew the sacrifice
owed and expected,
crossed the room to stand
on braided oval carpet.
Accepted.
He accepted.
Alone.
Alone, he faced it.
And at once it rose,
towered,
bent –
grim and featureless –
to greet the boy,
that strange opaque and slippery
column of vaporous gray,
insubstantial as the shadow
it did not, could not cast.
Atop its head of smoke,
a three-pointed crown,
and in a voice of fog and
dust and ashes,
spoke:
“This might as sweet
as honey been,
had first we not
each spake
with kings.”
Gray fog condensed and
looped and gathered and
in rising
rushing
hissing
torrent leapt into the boy,
bent back the slender neck,
stretched wide his mouth
to choking,
gasping,
until
— at last, at length —
only the boy remained.
Rigid, now.
Compacted.
Pressed full of vapor.
Crown and shadow
consumed and swallowed.
Alone.
He stood alone.
And they –
she and he,
themselves protecting –
did nothing,
nothing,
but turn.
They turned
away.
— C.Birde, 9/19