Poem free write: When You Were Young

Just a free write. Enjoy.

He meant to say a good many things, words that were prayed but never surfaced above the jetsam of gold and ritual. Words that were stitched in his skin, scarred and hushed. They grew rusted and metallic, as others of these stitched barbed wire into his jaw to keep his words dead and polite. His prison echoed about himself, as he could only now wait for judgment day.

And now they’ve grown into cinder blocks, thrusting thorns into his jaws and teeth, adding poison to his lights and mind. But the queen has been overthrown outside the prison walls. The jackal guard hunches, his ribs stretched against his royal prison gown and girth. He laughs for only a few nights more.

Dust cakes and clogs my throat; the prophets line up to be slaughtered. The others March on, collecting interest and moving pawns across the graffitied board. Coins are exchanged, deals whispered and made between pencil strokes. But I cannot see anyone above the smoke. They cannot even see eachother; perhaps it was made that way.

It snows whiter in a prison and falls ‘tween bars and murmurs affliction. But birds fly South for the winter, and moths draw closer to the flame. The poor drift together, while the rich drink the game.

And I mutter the words of the saints and fall awake when, it all suddenly ends. The righteous shall inherit the land and dwell therein forever.

The words of the prophets remain few.