The Ritual

Or “Ad Infinitum”

He woke to a stillness unknown to the waking
Under moon hung wan in the sky
A silent witness, it stood unavailing
Void of ether to play its light

Like unworn shoes or strange attire
He felt a kind of unbecoming
Attempting to rise from slumber supine
And gather his body and bearing

No plume of smoke or glow of fire
No spire of tent or tree
No beguiling mirages did even aspire
No signs of life could he see

Unending plain into hill undulating
Set him of his senses free
A wilderness for leagues extending
Or blankets drawn to his feet?

He blinked his eyes out of confusion
And instead regarded the sky
A divine canopy beyond deception
A bone lamp that gave no light

The stars, they too, were salt-like strewn
Whither they ought to be twinkling
Or blinking timidly, outshone by the moon
All but likenesses in a painting

He knew not to find his way by them
But there they were at least
Stalwart chiefs to watch over him
He’d plot his plight in peace

So, chin to arm, and arm to knee
He sat combing his mind
How had he even come to be
Asleep on the slope that night

But what does youth know of peace
His search returned fruitless
With fiery heart it tempts each beat
And soon his limbs grew restless

Now, traipsing up toward the crest
He let his thoughts wander
A modest hill, he thought, at best
Perhaps some clues lay yonder

The scene unfolding atop the summit
Though more or less the same
The sombre serenity of it
Even he could not disdain

No heat or cold, no light or shade
Had he felt since his waking
Yet with a nakedness he paid
For beauty contemplating

Of muted purple, slate, and blue
He’d never known the sight
The brazen grass in such strange hues
Perhaps, a trick of the night

A phantom breeze began to play
It sent the grass a-rippling
Though his skin, it did not sensate
The hair on it was bristling

A pool had rippled just so
Under a watchful moon
It’s water neither warm nor cold
Over it a figure loomed

Drowsing drums did drain and dull
Thirst from the bitter fruit
Soporific in the bracing lull
Of Medicine Man’s croon

Was this memory, or perhaps a vision?
An excerpt from a dream?
The more he entertained the notion
The less likely it seemed

Pondering purpose and prescription
Down the hill he went
It opened to a vast depression
Till sight was all but spent

Tips scorched of ambitions wild
Bent over in defeat
Growing taller on the leeward side
Blades dancing in the breeze

The grass, it beckoned with its sway
Milling about his knees
Siphoned with each sting away
His momentary ease

When he descended, at last, to the hollow
With growing trepidation
The moon above had closely followed
As if by its own volition

It cast no shadows with its dullness
Yet he began to feel
Hemmed in by a growing darkness
Where unknown terrors teemed

The grass here in tufts, matted and thinned
Warranting at least a look
Had it been beaten down by wind
Or trampled underfoot?

An imagined stirring at the edge of vision
A shameful, cowardly start
Wrenched from musing the ground uneven
He began to gallop and dart

Never looking, never turning to see
Never wanting for breath
No one hears, nor did he,
The final footfalls of death

With a blow, he was struck to the ground
In a flurry of fur and fang
In his ears poured a ferocious growl
That cowed his flailing hands

And past these hands came unperturbed
A grisly pair of jaws
Nestled round his neck with strength absurd
Without toil and without pause

And just as quick as it began
So did end the fray
The jagged, salivating fangs
Quickly wrenched away

He wakes in cold sweats
Heart beating out his chest
The dread of doom still impends

Down the slope once again
To the plain he descends
Like a feral colt untethered

On shaking legs, he staggers
What a nightmare! He gathers
Doubting the urge to fly

Barley a moment goes by
That the impulse subsides
Once again he falls to his predator

It is a wolf, he registers
Convulsing in terror
The teeth have returned to rake

With a jolt he’s awake
This time there’s no mistake
He goes pelting down the hill

He feels even still
The spreading of a chill
A weakness seeping from his core

Terror steals through his soul
As he stumbles and rolls
His limbs, out of fear, rendered lame

He never reaches the plain
The wolf is on him again
And again inflicts his demise

He is shaking this time
Barely a foot can he find
Trembling whimpers escape
The still night, they pervade
The wolf still comes for its kill

Sobbing, now, atop the hill
Sweat and blood is running chill
The tale untimely comes to mind
A ruinous plot of injured pride
The Wolf remembers with regret
Complicit in the birth of Death

He grovels and bleats
To silent ears for relief

Wretchedly, again, and again
He is mauled, and he is maimed

He now wakes in attendance
To its ever-impending presence

Insatiable is the wolf’s maw
Inescapable, its ensnaring jaws

Until the inevitable comes to pass
He is now waking in their grasp

Devoured in perpetuity
Overtaken by futility

He may well suffer till the dawn
Until from boy, the man is born