The gibbet elms - Fen

We have stood for centuries

Sentinels that frame the sky

We have felt the exhalation

Of souls passed under us

We have trembled in the cold winds

That lash the soils of death

We have drawn upon the poisoned strength

Of earth steeped in sorrow

Our limbs have twitched and quivered

To the sound of myriad snapping necks

Our roots remained anchored and unmoved

To the whispers of ending that clamour within

All now is silent and still

Yet resting not are the echoes of the lost

As twilight descends and the murders wheel to roost

The fallen rise again like mist

To drape once more from our arms

Like the rotting sails of a long-abandoned vessel

The scars of time have reaved their pain not

As the land sings its death-song again

We have stood for centuries

Sentinels that frame the sky

We have drawn upon the poisoned strength

Of earth steeped in sorrow

A final threnody for a forlorn convoy

That wanders, lost, in this bleak labyrinth

Condemned to the aether beyond time

A memorial pain unyielding that seeps into our souls