Twas in the deep midwinter when
An old man spake to me,
“Live as though tomorrow’s light is
A light you’ll never see.”

“Love the world as she paints herself --
Be not the critic here --
For wise as you may ever be,
The end is always near.”

His papery voice grew fainter
I saw him close his eyes;
He lay as still as one entombed
Empty and dead of sighs.

I rose me up quite stiffly then --
I dared not see his face --
For if I looked upon his corpse
His death my life would chase.

With wooden legs my body turned
To what had been the door
But now in this macabre crypt
The opening was no more.

Upon the floor my feet were cold,
Hard as midwinter’s ice,
While he lay calmly on the bed
Beset by snow starved mice.

I could not scream though hard I tried,
My throat was thick with dust,
And as I my cobwebbed fingers felt,
I knew a greater lust.

I would have tak’n a thousand glares
A world of hatred full
If only so that I could feel
The flesh upon my skull.

To spurn lost lovers I was willing
If e’er a deal were made
That brought the pulse back to my blood
And made the darkness fade.

The beast had woke within me,
I tore at my cag’d mind
No decency was left to me,
My tangled thoughts entwined.

And so I was a man no more –
A snarling angry bear –
Though my mind was wont to flee
My body was my snare.

It seemed I’d lost humanity,
I drifted with the tides
For death doth do great many things
And never its time bides.

Twas in the deep midwinter when
An old man spake to me,
“Live as though tomorrow’s light is
A light you’ll never see.”