I remember this dream, this nightmare returning.

The wind screams through a bloody plow

In a fallow field, forever burning stalk to ash.

A foul stench rises from furrowed rows—sulfur.

 

Hunched in the corner, a scarecrow blazes,

Writhing weakly, wailing: Nothing Grows.

 

Dead trees, bone white, swing crooked limbs

With empty nooses swaying like pendulums.

Sap pours from gnarled bark, crude black.

Brackish pools, swamping the roots, flow—sulfur.

 

Remains of unknown beasts, hooved and horned,

Line a wall, fixed sign reading: Food for Crows.

 

 Wings beat, beaks caw, a coldness stirs within.

Fear fills me overpouring, but nothing comes

To take my soul, though the devils fly around

Me in a ring, eyes bleeding from the sting—sulfur.

 

Then whispers, soft and sorrowful, play the wind,

Their promise: The morning will never come again.