Worn With Travail, A Traveller Considers His Rest
Lo, & I am worn with travail-
Many miles on broken feet-
More to go.
Traveller, you know the road, as do I:
Tattered socks, broken shoes, blistered soles, holes in my cloak,
ragged soul.
When I set down my shoes at the door for the final time,
my eyebrows will be dripping with rain that falls on my broken feet.
When I enter:
hearth & kin & skin.
When travails & travels are ended and I submit to time & sleep-
(Submit to the journey of the mind, ever across, and over the dark river.)
Vultures circle. Vultures gather where corpses are.
Drooling beasts with tongues hanging over teeth.
Rough beasts behind, rougher beasts, ahead.
(I hear their howls as I try to sleep, my head resting on an old pillow with little stuffing, crooked neck, twisted spine.)
If I survive this night, I will pick up my pack and travel on-
Hearing the call-
Hearing you call over the treetops, over soaring pines, echoing off the rocky cliffs.
