The Hell He Travels

Several ladies saw him walking by one day. They were struck and a little frightened by his appearance, his face fixed in gloom and smudged as though by soot, his beard bristling as though tinged with fire.

1

The hell he travels follows a map he made himself.
He shoulders his bedroll. The way is long, circuitous.
He has studied the terrain so carefully he will know
where to step and the well-trod paths to avoid.
Once he is there, Here, he will gasp, are fabulous sights
I have heard priests denounce as the glamour of evil.
The nun was there when his wife came home and found him.
He who was always gone, who wanted to be a mustang.
He was too old now, already well shod at thirty.
Nothing availed, little devils climbed into his dreams.
His wife found another country, where he went missing
as he was never where she was when she was here.
He anticipates nothing but knowledge, a farmboy Faust
who turns the future in his head until it clicks into place.

(to be resumed)

(5 December 20012)

copyright 2012 by Floyce Alexander