We phantoms stalked these rotting corpses’ fields of fate.
Assassins and their traitors and their lovers paid
a reaper's tax.
The nation's giver's fallen wafted before us.
We raised our scythes and, charging fast, we cut them
down.
Cries rung hollow.
The smoke became the air and then the sky was clear.
A dying village crumbled here no longer feared,
acres scorched.
Children, women, men all paid the Devil's fee;
thus the reaper comes without warning.
To think that they gave us love
we gave them hate.
The shepherd tried to warn us
impaled on our blade.
I accept this burden, whom I have killed.
They're my people and I cried,
but I didn't haunt them, finding now
tomorrow is too late!
Tomorrow is too late!
Ethan McGuire grew up in the mystical Missouri Ozarks, but eight years
ago he moved to the Florida Panhandle, and life near the Gulf of Mexico
has had a profound effect on him. By day, he is a healthcare information
technology professional. By night, he is a writer. Ethan is a proud member
of the West Florida Literary Federation and has written for TheEdBlog,
Three Rows Back, Inscriptions Writing Club, and The Legend.
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