Deathbed Song

Now is the time to tell it.

But how is it told, such pain?

Leave it behind; forget it.

Palled and joyless, her voice found some refrain.

The song that she sang wasn’t long,

But on she sang,

Some weird deathbed song.

“Gone,” she sang, “Gone to grave,

That humble cross you’ve kept cordoned off.”

Now I am a sight pathetic.

Furious, old, hunched, lame.

But now is the time to tell it.

I don’t like this.

I’ll tell it just the same.

She’s gone and she charged something foul:

“The cross,” she sang,

“You’ve kept cordoned off.”

“Gone,” she sang, “Gone to grave,

That humble cross you’ve kept cordoned off.”

A cross does mark a grave.

Rope around pole purports wall.

Was not for Jane.

Was meant for my own fall.

“Gone,” she sang, “Gone to grave,

That humble cross you’ve kept cordoned off.”