A curse placed, a darkly mark, a man beset by fear,
I wander narrow, crooked paths, mental walkways void of cheer.
My hands caked with drying mud, my limbs all wracked with tremors,
My grave, now freshly dug by me, while I severed mortal tethers,
Sat gaping, sucking, searching, pulling, dark tendrils snaking for my soul,
A ghastly figure directing nightmares, come searching for his toll.
I’ve paid in blood, in flesh and peace, yet nothing sates this ghoul,
Death follows me, with skeletal fingers, groping for his fool.
The world I’d left was full of life, both beautiful and light,
The world I’d spurned was void of all, a perpetual, unending night.
I staggered on through hidden roads, between the two known lands,
Terrified that I was destined to forever be, between two reaching hands.
In front of me I saw the promise of the world of man,
Behind me I heard the coming of the Reaper’s phantom clan.
Had light and life been closed to me, in my tomb must now I rest?
Must darkness overtake my eyes, and still the beating in my chest?
I ran down my middle path, afraid of what may pass,
Seeking to escape my fate and still my hourglass.
But my fate it seems I sealed, by choosing this new crime,
I’d passed the worlds of life and death by choosing past my time.
An angel and a demon, both appeared before my eyes,
To praise and damn me forever more, to bequeath to me my prize.
I squandered and cast aside the life I had been given,
But neither was I content to die, so from my grave I’d risen.
A middling, now, is what I am, a creature of the balance.
With life above, and death below, and I the hidden valance.
I’d thought I ran from Death, who sought to pull me down,
But he sought not for my soul, but for his newest clown.
Now I pass the fear anddread, and ride with haunted crew,
Hold your life and cherish it, or I may come for you.