Rust

I drag my feet through this barren field,
burdened by the clouds
an iron curtain, endless gray.
Time a weary sigh.

Memories, scattered shards,
glittering in the soil;
once bright, dulled by years
of trudging through half believed hopes.

If rest were a kingdom,
I’d kneel at its gates,
offering any number of prayers
for one real night of peace.

But the wind sneers, empty praise,
mocking my dream of relief.
I wander on, solitary soldier
long past the battle's cry.

I stand in dusk's solace,
arms too weary for another swing.
No more charges, no more parries
the blade in my hand a worn, silent witness
to all I once believed.

I drive the sword into the earth,
the tip bites the soil.
A final gesture of surrender
to battles won or lost,
the ground claims it in painless degrees.

Rust begins its patient work,
a destroyer, steel to dust.
The wind passes,
carrying my last sigh
through tall grass and empty fields.

I linger on tired legs,
listening to the nothing that remains
my footprints fading,
the blade sinking deeper.

A silent memorial, unadorned,
half-lost to it’s birthing soil,
offering a single, wry epitaph...
“A fitting tombstone, no?”