If I Were a Poet

Down lonely streets my footsteps echoing—
A doorway with no door, a dried-up well…
It seems impossible there was a king
who ruled this place before his kingdom fell.
He couldn’t know that war would clench its fist
and crush the city’s splendor into dust.
He couldn’t taste the poison in the kiss
of time reducing armories to rust.
An empty throne: I sit and pray in vain;
the icy whisper of the wind replies.
No hope survives; no majesty remains.
And now my fate too late I realize:
I cannot leave this place, for I will be
forever haunted by eternity.