The Canticle of Broken Vows
Beneath the moon’s pale, ever-watchful eye,
Where shadows cloak the stones of ages past,
A youth, whose quill once danced with stars on high,
Now treads through halls where hope submits to blight.
The temple’s breath—a sigh of dust and frost—
Enshrouds his steps, each pillar crowned with time,
As though the gods themselves lament the cost
Of promises dissolved like autumn’s rime.
His name, once sung in courts where laurels bloomed,
Now withers on the tongues of those who knew
The weight of verses forged in chambers gloomed,
Where ink ran black with prophecies untrue.
Yet here he seeks the shrine of fading grace,
To kneel before the silence he must face.
“O hallowed vault,” he whispers to the air,
“Where echoes cling like ivy to the dead,
I bore a oath as fragile as a prayer,
Now broken as the vows the stars have fled.
She bid me write our tale in endless rhyme—
A ballad spun from dawn’s untainted gold—
But folly’s hand betrayed me to the chime
Of hours that no mortal verse may hold.”
The walls, like ancient sentinels, incline
To hear the tremor in his hollow tone.
A fresco fades—a maiden intertwined
With lilies, now by cracks and moss o’erthrown.
Her eyes, once bright as summer’s first decree,
Now gaze through him, their light to ash resigned,
A portrait of the pledge that could not be,
The love he sealed, then left to rot, enshrined.
III
Recall the night when fever gripped her frame,
Her breath a fragile flutter ‘gainst his palm.
“Promise,” she pled, “that though I fade like flame,
You’ll weave our joy into a ceaseless psalm.
Let not my name be claimed by silent earth,
But carved in lines no winter can devour.”
He kissed her brow and swore her spirit’s worth
Would blaze eternal in his lyric power.
Yet lo! The quill that vowed to defy death
Grew heavy as the shroud upon her bier.
Each stanza choked with grief’s unyielding breath,
Each metaphor a vessel for his fear.
The world, once ripe with melodies unsung,
Now dripped with hues of sorrow’s stagnant brine,
Till every word beneath his fingers hung
As chains, not charms—a prison of design.
IV
Years slipped like grains through fate’s unfeeling glass,
His parchment stained with tears, not noble fire.
The muse, who once in moonlit groves would pass,
Now fled his heart’s extinguished funeral pyre.
He sought the temple where the ancients wept
For dreams entombed in marble’s cold embrace,
To plead with ghosts whose promises they kept,
Or burn his tome and forfeit memory’s grace.
“Behold!” he cries, “the wreck of all I swore—
A tome of lies, its pages gnawed by shame.
Where is the anthem meant to soar and soar?
A dirge of ash is all my craft can claim.”
The vault, indifferent to his mortal ache,
Returns his voice in whispers, thin and dim,
As night’s black tendrils coil round to take
The remnants of the light once kindled him.
V
A rustle stirs—a spectral shape takes form,
Not hers, but something older, bleak, and vast.
Its voice, the creak of forests in a storm:
“You barter griefs the future shall recast.
Each vow undone becomes a serpent’s tooth,
Each truth deferred, a thorn in time’s closed fist.
The temple claims the debt of squandered youth—
Here, poets’ bones with shattered oaths are kissed.”
He stumbles back, the specter’s breath like ice,
Yet in its gaze, a perverse mercy dwells.
“One final verse may pay the fatal price
To break the curse your failing heart compels.
But know this: ink and blood, when merged, decree
The singer’s breath shall blend with fading song.
Choose—bind your soul to art’s eternity,
Or bear the ache of weakness lifelong.”
VI
The poet kneels, the dagger in his grip
A colder weight than any pen he bore.
“If ink is doom, then let the chalice drip
Till death’s dark vintage floods this broken shore.
For she, whose name I damned to silence’ keep,
Shall hear this hymn, though hell’s own choir descend.”
The blade descends—a crimson torrent’s leap—
His lifeblood stains the vows he could not mend.
The final line etches in gasps and throes,
A scarlet stanza on the temple’s floor.
The walls inhale, the ancient darkness grows,
And seals his pact with shadows evermore.
Above, the moon withdraws her silver face,
As stones entomb the poet’s last embrace.
VII
Dawn breaks, but where the temple once aspired,
A mound of dust and echoes now resides.
No ballads rise from ash where he expired,
No mourners come, nor laurels, nor brides.
Yet sometimes, when the moon is veiled and thin,
A sigh is heard—a pen’s faint scratch, a plea—
The poet’s ghost, condemned to trace within
The lines of promise none shall ever see.
Where shadows cloak the stones of ages past,
A youth, whose quill once danced with stars on high,
Now treads through halls where hope submits to blight.
The temple’s breath—a sigh of dust and frost—
Enshrouds his steps, each pillar crowned with time,
As though the gods themselves lament the cost
Of promises dissolved like autumn’s rime.
His name, once sung in courts where laurels bloomed,
Now withers on the tongues of those who knew
The weight of verses forged in chambers gloomed,
Where ink ran black with prophecies untrue.
Yet here he seeks the shrine of fading grace,
To kneel before the silence he must face.
“O hallowed vault,” he whispers to the air,
“Where echoes cling like ivy to the dead,
I bore a oath as fragile as a prayer,
Now broken as the vows the stars have fled.
She bid me write our tale in endless rhyme—
A ballad spun from dawn’s untainted gold—
But folly’s hand betrayed me to the chime
Of hours that no mortal verse may hold.”
The walls, like ancient sentinels, incline
To hear the tremor in his hollow tone.
A fresco fades—a maiden intertwined
With lilies, now by cracks and moss o’erthrown.
Her eyes, once bright as summer’s first decree,
Now gaze through him, their light to ash resigned,
A portrait of the pledge that could not be,
The love he sealed, then left to rot, enshrined.
III
Recall the night when fever gripped her frame,
Her breath a fragile flutter ‘gainst his palm.
“Promise,” she pled, “that though I fade like flame,
You’ll weave our joy into a ceaseless psalm.
Let not my name be claimed by silent earth,
But carved in lines no winter can devour.”
He kissed her brow and swore her spirit’s worth
Would blaze eternal in his lyric power.
Yet lo! The quill that vowed to defy death
Grew heavy as the shroud upon her bier.
Each stanza choked with grief’s unyielding breath,
Each metaphor a vessel for his fear.
The world, once ripe with melodies unsung,
Now dripped with hues of sorrow’s stagnant brine,
Till every word beneath his fingers hung
As chains, not charms—a prison of design.
IV
Years slipped like grains through fate’s unfeeling glass,
His parchment stained with tears, not noble fire.
The muse, who once in moonlit groves would pass,
Now fled his heart’s extinguished funeral pyre.
He sought the temple where the ancients wept
For dreams entombed in marble’s cold embrace,
To plead with ghosts whose promises they kept,
Or burn his tome and forfeit memory’s grace.
“Behold!” he cries, “the wreck of all I swore—
A tome of lies, its pages gnawed by shame.
Where is the anthem meant to soar and soar?
A dirge of ash is all my craft can claim.”
The vault, indifferent to his mortal ache,
Returns his voice in whispers, thin and dim,
As night’s black tendrils coil round to take
The remnants of the light once kindled him.
V
A rustle stirs—a spectral shape takes form,
Not hers, but something older, bleak, and vast.
Its voice, the creak of forests in a storm:
“You barter griefs the future shall recast.
Each vow undone becomes a serpent’s tooth,
Each truth deferred, a thorn in time’s closed fist.
The temple claims the debt of squandered youth—
Here, poets’ bones with shattered oaths are kissed.”
He stumbles back, the specter’s breath like ice,
Yet in its gaze, a perverse mercy dwells.
“One final verse may pay the fatal price
To break the curse your failing heart compels.
But know this: ink and blood, when merged, decree
The singer’s breath shall blend with fading song.
Choose—bind your soul to art’s eternity,
Or bear the ache of weakness lifelong.”
VI
The poet kneels, the dagger in his grip
A colder weight than any pen he bore.
“If ink is doom, then let the chalice drip
Till death’s dark vintage floods this broken shore.
For she, whose name I damned to silence’ keep,
Shall hear this hymn, though hell’s own choir descend.”
The blade descends—a crimson torrent’s leap—
His lifeblood stains the vows he could not mend.
The final line etches in gasps and throes,
A scarlet stanza on the temple’s floor.
The walls inhale, the ancient darkness grows,
And seals his pact with shadows evermore.
Above, the moon withdraws her silver face,
As stones entomb the poet’s last embrace.
VII
Dawn breaks, but where the temple once aspired,
A mound of dust and echoes now resides.
No ballads rise from ash where he expired,
No mourners come, nor laurels, nor brides.
Yet sometimes, when the moon is veiled and thin,
A sigh is heard—a pen’s faint scratch, a plea—
The poet’s ghost, condemned to trace within
The lines of promise none shall ever see.
