Burning, Burning, Burning

The cabin in the woods had been

abandoned

for years,

but one night,

a candle burned

in the window.

•

I am not sure how I got here,

as my eyes fill with tears

My heart trembles with each beat rising to

a crescendo

•

In the darkness, I am walking

My clothes are dripping

wet and

soddened

In the darkness, I am searching

There is this candle,

it warms me slightly

my only source of light

Burning, burning, burning

I must not let it go out!

•

A moment ago, I was with my daughter

out on the

lake

But now I am shivering in the dark

Something sent me walking—

Like

ghostly hands

clawing

at my back

•

The silence is consuming

It fills my lungs with frisson

The only sound is of my breathing

and the darkness keeps enclosing

Where am I?

Where am I going?

I have no choice but to follow my senses

without a doubt

the glow in my hands provides me some relief

Burning, burning, burning

I must not let it go out!

•

Yet I am moving, and I am still alive

Or am I dreaming—

Or could it be that I have died?

Is this purgatory? Did I fall down a well?

Where is Satan?

I do not see him

I must know

Is this hell?

•

Then a noise from up above

The sound of wings flapping, flying—

a crow, a jay, or maybe a dove?

I hear it coo—

Friend, what is your name?

Please stay with me, I need the company—

So long as you don’t take away

my flame

•

What creature is this? Does it know its way?

And if I follow it,

Will I see again the day?

The darkness blinds my fright

Burning, burning, burning

I must not let it go out!

•

While I worry, a rattle of chains from above

Wings, larger, much larger than a dove’s

Like a shackled angel descending from an open grotto

How ethereal!

I await the music

Of some macabre Erato

•

Then, a moment

or perhaps two

There is nothing,

only silence

As if the angel and the dove both ceased

I call out—there is no response

I look up for some reprieve

But there is

nothing

nothing

nothing

•

Then my conscience, it exhorts me—

I must not let it go out

•

Something light falls upon my head

Then another

a mix of droplets

and some feathers

And now before me, where I can see

what I had dread

The white dove

is dead

•

Burning, burning, burning

I must not let it go out!

•

What has transpired? Am I allowed to

question

when I am disbelieving—

that a creature would maim a symbol of virtue

or a demon pretending

Because harm I am capable of too

•

Burning, burning, burning

I must not let it go out!

•

What foolish thoughts I have

When the sound of a child’s voice

a girl’s

Interrupts my ghastly concepts

Singing, it eases my uncertainty slightly

Until the mourning of a man’s hollow voice

fills my head

and draws confusion upon my course

•

I inquire—Who is there?

But the child’s voice

which once was sweetly singing

disappears as an echo

The man still, he is weeping

His crying grows near

Though his voice—

I recognize

A gentle tone that I hold dear

•

Burning, burning, burning

I must not let it go out!

•

Then it dawns upon me—

The man—my husband!

Why are you crying?

I am right here!

His hollow grieving rings

like rusty bells

Ringing, ringing, ringing

Like the child’s voice

—which once was sweetly singing

•

Burning, burning, burning

I must not let it go out!

•

“My daughter! My sweet daughter!”

He cries

“Why have you gone and left your father”—

No that cannot be!

“Drowned along with your mother”—

But how? I vehemently shout

It could not have

been—

I must not let it go out!

•

His voice fades away

Burning, burning, burning!

But it spoke no truth

My sanity batters me into a quake

•

Burning, burning, burning!

Then—

a wave crashes

in my lungs

and they begin to ache

•

Burning, burning, burning!

I see it flicker in the grave

•

Burning, burning, burning!

nihility was the beast

that beckoned me

to stay

•

Burning, burning, burning!

a hand from the darkness—

it reaches

for my light

•

Burning, burning, burning!

a bitter wind

without

a name

•

Burning, burning, burning!

come to rid me

of my only

flame

•

Burning, burning—

gone.

•

I lit a candle, and it was burning

The sands of time were lapsing—

overturning

My conscience grew to nothing

It denied me heaven

And it

denied me hell as well

It knew no mercy

it gave me nothing

•

I took a life

After I gave it mine

It felt

unfair

So I reclaimed it

for all of

time

•

Burning, burning…

I never came to ever knowing—

whether

dreams

were the demise

that always took us

by surprise

Or the nightmare was the waking

mortality

undertaken.