The noise


    of exploding shells


    and the wails of men


    have subsided.


    The sounds have drifted


    into the unfurled black.


    Clouds of mist brood above


    a place


    where valleys and rivers meet.


    Night over the nightmare settles,


    cold and mute,


    Save where there is heard the soft flutter


    of ragged cloth,


    Its billowing stirs the Lost within,


    the clamour of voices,


    wailing and weeping


    of all the things


    that were


    and can never be again.


    He is a place,


    a torment,


    a fear,The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    a destiny


    in the shape of a man,


    hooded and cloaked,


    the size of a star,


    or the smallest shadow,


    a sliver of an instant,


    an endless vanishing,


    sliding through the infinite,


    In that space


    between waking and dreams,


    cloaked in the ecliptic hues


    of the Reaper.


    He wanders


    on roads empyreal and unseen,


    accompanied by the wails


    of the damned.


    It hums and echoes


    from his ragged cloak,


    spun into being


    when time began


    He stands there


    in a veil of darkness,


    and his raiment,


    stirred by cosmic winds,


    gives voice to


    the memories of lost civilizations,


    and the sky is filled


    with the scent of dead worlds.