Shadows Mounting

With intravenous tubes keeping him alive,

The elderly man kept writing his memoir,

“Foreshadowing the Delirium of Peace.”

Outside…rain

Inside…one of the local butcher’s prize carrion pests

Has made it it’s business to annoy the old man,

Of course, the cat took only cursory notice,

Knowing she was outmaneuvered

By the feisty intruder,

And could only hope ol’ Blacky,

The resident spider in the ceiling’s corner,

Might lure the harasser

To its web.

The gout-footed caregiver

In a faded bathrobe and frayed slippers

Carefully moved her oversized body

Forward balancing a cup of diluted tea

For…

Yes

The aged writer of failing memory

As he clumsily scribed another thought across the page

For his opus of non-sequiturial logic

Trying to force the square peg of “Madness”

Into the round hole of “Peace.”

Sipping the watered-down beverage

He allowed his cataract-afflicted eyes

To peer out the window

Where skies of storm and sun fought for dominance,

While across the street on a park bench

Two lovers embraced,

Feeling their own foreshadowing,

Like seeing their way with white canes

Through the sanctum of their future.

He turned back to his scribbly, coffee and tea-stained writings,

Groping for the words that might come next.

Perhaps like cloud and sun in battle,

All might coalesce into visions of darkness,

The quiet compatibility of nothingness and oneness.

Nirvana peace?

.

“…perchance to dream…”

?