Toastage: 14 July 1943

Last night I dreamed I walked along the sand

Beneath a rocky mountain peak that towered

So high above as if it would command

All life, and yet beneath the sky, it cowered

I spied a path and stumbled up a hill

That quickly merged, in one quite seamless leap

Into the mountain’s jaggered frame, until

I faltered, as the way became too steep

Then soon the path began to disappear

And in its place was barely room enough

For me to cling against the stone-faced sheer,

I climbed on as the way became too rough

For how I fought to make it up the wall,

As Thought, with black intent, upon me crept

You know, you could, from this height, end it all…

How I suffered! How I prayed! How I wept!

And so I woke to find it but a dream

Although, not quite. Atop the mountain peak

I felt I’d seen a man of lowly mien

With sun-scarred skin and tattered clothes and meek

The look within his eyes, that spilled the cry

Of his own mountain hell. For through my tears

I saw upon his back he held the sky

I lay there in the dark beneath my fears.

______________________________

Toastage