The Hermit

The Hermit

 

To the one who kept the universe alone:

Whose blackened eyes have seen the century,

Black and grey, flung against shadows on the wall,

From his moss covered house across the lake.

Once in fall, I heard the eldritch stirring,

Something solid broke the glass around the lake,

And proceeded to fill my heart with horror.

And whatever large and ancient thing

That dared to break the silence of the pines,

Came slowly out the water and chilled my brain,

And sent my memory back a ways, to childhood,

Standing by the lake in summer, the fog gone,

And seeing, for the first time, the solitary home

The one who dare not speak, lest he be discovered

And taken. And when the thing I feared beyond

Approached the farther shore, breaking the mist

So that I could see, and what I saw did bring me

Down the painful road of memory, lost to eons.

A woman in the bedroom, a child in the bath.

The massive bulking form to hideous to describe

Which pulled itself from the water, and that was all.

Reviews

[Emily]

This was a very well written piece. I really enjoyed reading it. It reminds me a bit of Hemingway's "old man and the sea" in the way that it tells the type of story it tells and the wording you used. Well done. I really enjoyed 'seeing' this as I read through it. The imagery was strong and the phrases were well chosen.

[miSS LEaf]

haunting.. wonderful.. excellent ~L