Over The Shoulder

Struggle with the beast,

but don’t believe you’ll win.

In this swirling phase

that carries down dregs

to a drowning pool,

tooth and claw cannot

curtail the pain,

or rouse the will to leave

this dreadful staring place

where the enemy remains.

Ignore and it endure,

this shadow will not go.

Scrub the bloody clothes

in the tumbling burn

and the Wailing Washer

may tell you who may

die or thrive.

You’ve no calling

to control this pain,

or un-toll the highest

bell that lets you breathe again.

Saying this sorrow

will never solve it,

a wound passed around

many hundred hands.

Marked man and woman

at break of day and close,

tensed to receive a blow

that comes another way.

Over the angel and the worm,

the lone thread snaps and turns

each human heart astray,

a candle inching every life away.

Listen to the need that goes

before the bursting bomb,

the song going on and on

until each sound

ends in silence.