VIII

The coffin's click assailed my ears,
my heartbeat drummed out notes.
Thoughts flooded with a treacle sea,
but Fear - the bastard - floats.

A woman, leather-bound and dark,
her eyes gun barrel ends,
had pinned my careless self against
a rock with rifle's lens.

I saw her tendons tighten 'gainst
the trigger's hairline clasp
and threw myself into a roll
to her frustrated gasp.

"I seek not death!" I yelled aloud,
and threw my gun aside.
This filthy, deadly, rarest girl
could not in hate reside.


IX

Her gun on me, she told me of
communities survived,
of how they eked a hellish life,
existence never thrived.

With panic in her desperate gaze,
she bade me move along
before the others saw me as
a brick to make them strong.

"You cannot understand," she said,
"this isn't what you need,"
but I would sacrifice all time
for ten minutes of creed.

Reluctantly, she took me down
into the valley's maw.
Despite her pessimistic tone,
this was my dream restored.


X

Within an hour, the night played host
to kidnap's treachery,
as ambushers cloaked in the dark
had strapped me to a tree.

She'd looked at me with silent eyes,
a mute testimony
to how a lonely heart is tricked
by thoughts of company.

The rock-dead wood pressed at my back
like nature's cold revenge.
My captors jigged and chanted like
demons in their demesne.

Their gazes fed upon my form
with fever's fervoured lust.
Three men insane. One frightened girl.
Me and my foolish trust.