Time Beleaguered

Dusk threatens with tendrils of gold

To put me to sleep in the loveliest fold

“Just up the stream” by a nymph, I’m told

Is where I can run and never grow old

But the decaying smell of moss and mold

Lies just behind and bites like bitter cold

Now I’ve gone too far, this life I’ve sold

I look for an escape, however faint or bold

But as I turn to look back at the trail

I realize that I, hearty and hale

Walked while, in tow, this infallible veil

Ate the ground at my heel, dusty and frail

It left behind neither mountain nor dale

Nor anything constructed with pillar or wale

So, with a shrug, I turned into the gale

“There’s no retreat, may the storm be my grail”

Onward I walk

In search of the loch

With the Youth Fountain’s stock

That the veil, I might mock

One-Way