Wurmian Shroud

Ten thousand winters forlorn
Betwixt the harvesting scythe
And hawthorn scepter's blaze
Trees like haunting sculptures
Have ever girt the way.

Ten thousand winters past...
The seasons were mired in grey
The heavens churned in languid streams-
Tempests thrashing on silver mirrors
And horns caressed the gibbous moon.

Chill as the void between veiled stars
The howling Wurm in hoary vesture
The with'ring world did wreath
As the reaper o'er the moribund
His frigid pall would drape.

Huddled in earth 'round Promethean tears
The pastel light illumed pale faces
Of Man fallen benighted.

They sought hope
And severance from the cold.

Through shrieking, scathing, star-blown winds
Long was the path
To a hallowed sell of dying leaves
A vestige of green seasons.

With what rites, ghastly they danced
As moths fluttering towards flames
Shadows formed and crept from their mouths
And drew them
From the solitude of the wood
to the more dreadful solitude of heart.

With tongues of honeyed thorns
They awoke me
Leprous mouths of dwindling faith
They invoked me.

Carving their hopes in my flesh
The Wurm collapsed into my marrow
By my blood the season was bought...

Old memories swollen
as myriad bloated corpses
Rising on putrescent tides
Of some loathsome sea
But like the sea, they recede.