Autumn People

Autumn People

by: edge

Ragged and raw wind of gossip

thickness,

pulsing around her trembling frame.

Her words swim

in the polluted waters,

that had once been

the moat encircling her domain.

Hungry reptiles in her courtyard

green scaly-faced monsters

on the slippery incline,

Of the treachery of their desire.

Arriving in droves,

gathering at the foot hills of her mountain.

Watching... for a sign.

Hungrily awaiting her downfall,

her collapse and decline

Would feed their quickening blood.

For now sustained on the appetizer

Of her heightened dread.

They would starve if not for the feast of fear,

and death's arms would fold them

back to the mud and mire of their marsh.

She rallies and cries

"Begone damned and woebegone,

sink into the slime

from whence thee spawned

get thee gone, Satan's children

quit thy hold upon my heart

discontinue desist and depart

for

*"by the pricking of my thumbs

something wicked this way comes..."

(*quote by William Shakespeare)