HOPE

Truth perished in blackened maws,

the skies rained gritty greyness

in commiseration with Earth's raw,

ragged retching.

The season of Shadows blotted out

the sun, wrested blood, bones

and words from mouths and nascent

breath from wombs.

Gold was their panacea, their souls

they laid upon Mammon's

glittering altar, as rebel saints' missals

stained cruel crimson.

Such malcontents seeking redress He

banished into limbo, sundered

legacies of history's pilgrims of peace

in grim attendance.

Nor dissent nor usurpation would He

countenance, this herald of the

spirit's plague, its famine and ruination 

amid gilded air and contrived radiance.

Man grew wary of Light amid his own

ominously waning awe for Life.

Coruscating mirages showering sparks

into nothingness held him in thrall.

Nothingness could not prevail, for naught

remained to sustain its vastness.

Now the meadows bloom grey and we,

the living, must seek ancient seeds

in the gold flecked dirt and hope for rain.

© 2015 Lily's Verse

Lilium Candidum

Image: HOPE

Artist: George Frederic Watts

Source: Google Art Project