A Trek To Freedom Poem by Robert Dummett

He shuffled stolidly down the brown track,
Dust pitted to skin and in his head
He carried the hamlet and rusted
Remorse in Autumn's air. With faces hidden
Behind curtains, some tired and cowed, beaten
And bowed, furrowed by toil's gouging scalpel,
Eyes peeped curiously.
Mist shrouded leaves shaking and netted
Sooted chimney pots in checkered circles.
Gladness was always there in priceless years
When love paddled his boat beyond reefs.
Now, thought burnt his eyes and mist
Got ready to spill splashes of saline
Sorrow from memory's bank,
But he stepped forward into the present
Again, where fog buried footprints while love's
Call drifted softly and words waned and faded
Slowly through the haze, and down time's alley
Step by step, vague images plod
Into engulfing whiteness.