(AKA The Last Piece of Chalk)

Here I write, at the end of things

Of pain unparalleled

My brethren: used up, dwindling

Stubs scarcely to be held

Mere dots where once proud columns lay

Tales ended with a period

Muddled dust in shades of grey

Once shone in colors myriad

Remembrance falls to me alone

No other bell will toll

No flags half mast, no widows moan

For rubble in a bowl

My only solace to belay

This sick survivor’s guilt:

The slate eroding me away

The fate for which we’re built.