Catacombs

Before the open maw of the catacombs,
daylight falling away beyond the portal,
I steel myself a moment, questioning
my willingness to make the dire descent.

After a breath, I set my mind to enter,
and take the first few steps into the black,
as I let my eyes adjust to the darkness.

From the start, I fight the urge to turn away.
But, who will ever know what lies beneath,
or know the names of those now long-forgotten?

Free to wander, my thoughts go to the shadows,
and I send out my darting eyes in search,
scanning the endless depths of the winding tunnels,
for what resides within the darker recesses.

Stricken, my eyes fall on the sun-bleached bone
of a skull, leering within the candlelight,
shining in fullness like a cold, dead moon;
no more alive, yet a specter of the past,
come now to tell the story of its passing,
of how its life had once been torn away,
and now resides within a loathsome grave.

Unable to avoid that baleful gaze,
I cannot help but tremble, overcome
by a degree of fear not felt before,
yet ever more unable to turn away.

I wonder what it is that bound her here.
And, though the skull is all that still remains,
I sense the spirit it once housed lives on.

Beneath the darkest veil, she hides her face,
yet there is still a glint of light reflected,
a halo so bright even death can’t stifle,
and refuses to fade into the shadows.

Somewhere hidden within the empty sockets,
her eyes still sparkle, full of living days,
such days that she alone had ever seen,
and fill the empty voids her demise had wrought.

For, there is something more within its stare,
a look of somberness, or that of pleading,
that I would sit and listen to her story,
and not return her memory to the grave,
there to be forfeit once again to silence.