The delay is with the ravens. There is little left to recompense, the army is tattered and poor. Is that the circling of a flock? We are near, then, and almost clean of rations. The stargazer led us behind the southern knob. A wise choice in retrospect, but the wolf howlings hollowed my insides, and courage has long been banished by desperation. This is the second act, boys, clean your weapons. It is all I can muster to stand straight upon a stump and call forth like a man still whole.
Night falls heavy, as it has since forty-three. The ginseng trail winds us down a water carved slope. We drink for the first time in days, eat scuppernongs and sing sea ballads – anything to help forget how earth bound we are. Every boot sighs with every step. This is a continuum, a snake drawn back upon itself, a futile droll that is played out in wind-moaning insomnia. To think of a night under covers, curled beneath the warm tent of a lover. These are perfections too sharp to fathom. Here, stuck together by fear, draped in war-molded costumes, with loose bowels and a slug in ones shoulder – it is unwise to dream pretty thoughts.
The sound is struck. Silence lingers in the unsteady morning; the moment drags when the body is just roused, before the mind comes to. A mighty weapon barks. Three hammers fall to release this century’s molten ball. Pounding feet. A battle chant. The thud of axes, and the sliding of a great towns worth of gentlemen uneasily back into the grave.
