His Shadow Speaks

I was his shadow once.
Perhaps you saw me,
hooked close by his heels,
flaring up ten times his size.

Defined in silhouette
I was more sharp, defiant,
battle-ready than any human boy.

Ere beside him was I poised
against broad pirate planks.
I joined him move for move.

Avast Ye Hook! Ye Snee!
Fear him and thus fear me!

We danced between the sun and sea,
no two more matched in bravery.
Until the drooping sun claimed light,
I was each day his nature’s knight.

When nighttime fell, we hid
beneath a tree and rocked
in our sage symmetry
by candlelight and fire’s flare,
with unlit pipe, unruly hair,
he spoke and lost boys listened.

He listened when I spoke to him,
we gloated, strategized
until he slept, and I
was naught.

Twas his thought~
travel back.
For he is human born,
enough of real boy left in him
to feel the lure of stories told
while floating by a window,
bold and hovering in bliss.

Twas his thought~
travel back.
For he is human born,
and there forgot imagination’s strife,
and heavy-lidded drank up life,
dreaming to the sweetest song
the world can know~

the voice of Mother
reading fairy tales.

Was it humanity
caused our undoing?

We came too close,
and from him I was shorn.
Now he is less than he could be,
less fierce by half,
while I await him here
in limp gray half-life,
faded and unclear.