Share   Print  Save   Become a Fan

I have not written a poem like this before with, perhaps it should have stayed in my head. The rhyming verses are 1-4, 2-6, 3-5.
Each verse is a word or two longer, but when I read all of it this change did not seem to matter.

Low were the clouds which scurried
Across the stubbled fields that day.
As Tom, a gentleman of the road
Trudged, shoulders stooped, unhurried
Towards the old stone barn, a nights abode
With its bed of sweet smelling hay.

Tired was his old thin body,
Upon which time had taken its toll.
For nigh twenty years he’d walked the lanes
Across hill and vale oft times left boggy,
By mists, and showers and drenching rains,
Thankful when he climbed a hill to its knoll.

Mary had left him a long while back,
Her leaving still haunted his mind.
Memories he had found hard to forget.
So he had travelled the roads and narrow track,
Chatting at times with folk that he met
Hoping to leave thoughts of her far behind.

Rounding the corner of the old wooden barn,
With its sweet smelling hay piled high.
Shep; his old mate barked a sharp welcome,
He knew the dog would keep him from harm.
So he gathered up the straw and then some,
And in slumber he’d forget Mary by and by.

With Shep sound asleep beside his sleeping form,
Her head resting on his undulating chest.
Both slept the slumber of an exhausting day,
Safe and sound from any winters impending storm.
Beneath stoned roof to keep any rain at bay,
Though on the morrow, in sleep, Tom was laid to rest.