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The Watchman

Writer's picture: James YearyJames Yeary

Updated: Apr 24, 2021



The noise of thunder rumbles somewhere off in the world.

Alone again, and watching for anything, everything.

Could darkness move? It seemed to these days,

shifting and darting, an unknown savage earth that surrounds

the uneven hill full of ragged rocks and broken things,

twisted metal and rusted pieces of the past.


The shadowed place where The Watchman waits—

black raindrops snaking down his ragged sleeve--

Worn from this new age.

His wet eyelids are invisible, hidden behind a mask that reflects nothing

With its tubes that lead to his backpack, the outside no longer safe to breathe.


The only eyes that look out to the smoldering horizon glow green and scan left to right

Like the eyes of a predator.

A flash of lightning illuminates the hooded creature in an instant

His scarred plate armor wrapped in a heavy cloak

Some pieces glowing a soft red, others only glinting flat grey

More a strange metal being from another world than a man from this one.

His weapon is wrapped in ribbons of cloth and rests on the edge of a boulder--

the barrel peering through the rocks of the dead terrain that rises and falls like waves of night.

Small vented cannisters hang from his belt

a strap of ammunition slung over his broad shoulder.

He would appear a hulking figure in the daylight, but here he is the nightscape.

If not for the darkness the patch on his left shoulder would be visible,

a cluster of words and symbols that no longer mean anything.

The Watchman remembers for a moment; he remembers when the sky was blue

And when you could tilt your head back and drink the rain if you wanted.

He pulls a deep breath through the expressionless mask, raspy and deep

And remembers when the air was clean, when he smelled the woods of the south

and the perfume of the girl that he’d danced with at prom.

Tonight, the air is death.

He remembers standing in a wide room with other men and taking an oath

About honor and prestige

Esprit de corps

He remembers helping and hurting, watching and learning

before it all went wrong.

Before crowds ran for safety that didn’t exist

and the air turned cold and stale.

The Watchman’s sights train on the line of trees below

Wind and rain whipping scorched branches and cracked earth

as a lone figure emerges

Orders are orders, and…well.

Orders are orders.

The girl can’t be any older than 19, and struggles through the dead scene

like an actress on an empty stage, her face covered in ash—

the child in her hands wrapped in a thick blanket.

The Watchman pauses for a moment.


Orders are orders, and…well…

He doesn’t move a muscle as the weapon dials in on its target.

Her face is clear and beautiful and scared now but orders are orders, and—

dancing at prom and drinking the rain and the smell of the woods.

The woman staggers off to the East and disappears again—

she’ll reach her destination now.

The Watchman breathes out and remembers again,

and thinks about the world where orders are orders and where that got us.

Maybe we could go back sometime…just for a little bit.

Far back and far away from the ragged patch of earth

Where the Watchman waits.





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