The Vulture

Those birds, those horrid blood sucking birds

Circling overhead, their red collared necks deep crimson in the setting sun.

Sensing the departure of spirit and will,

Waiting for the living to become lifeless,

Relishing the coming of death.

What morbid creatures are these, heartless and soulless.

Lying here, is this to be my last vision,

This hideous species of fowl

Bent of emptying my sockets, disemboweling me,

A meal for the taking.

Impaled by the prey I so stealthily sought,

Victim of my own arrogance.

Alone and lonely, shielded in blood soaked clothes

Most certainly this is not the end I envisioned.

What of my loving wife,

What will become of my children,

What of?

They circle…

Lower now, they smell the end is near,

Smell of death is in the air, death is inevitable.

Cold is setting in, the end is close.

Swooping low, these maggots, they torture me,

Flapping of their wings, stench of rotting flesh.

Daylight is fading,

I am so tired, so cold, so at peace.

Do what you will my relentless tormentors;

My family will remember me as I was not as I am,

A poor wretch soon to be torn and scattered,

Nothing but a whisper on the four winds.

Take me O’ winged beasts, take me now!

My time has come,

…Farewell.

~

~~ Dominic R. DiFrancesco ~~