As deepening darkness pressed all around, and shapes began to circle ‘round
in the evil of the night, claws of winter’s hellish blight slid free.
As the cold, cruel sun so quickly set, and nocturnal creatures called to their pet,
all light in the winter woods was swallowed.
A biting chill flowed all around, a bitter frost that now unbound
a nightmare wherein warmth was lost.
Here fearsome monsters prowled, the wood itself a hungry growl…
Umbral blight drew its curtain down, ‘till tiny eyes start to drown,
a wondrous garnish for those stalking him, just out of sight.
Just beyond, ‘midst frost and shade and their chill serenade.
nearly lost among torturous trees was a chance at life.
Hope existed in that wintery light: hope they might reunite…
Short legs turned in his frantic dash, a maddened crash,
towards the protective warmth ahead.
Soft music carried along, a warm, loving caress, near-gone.
Laughter and a land without all the monsters here about,
enveloped by soft colors the match of a kinder, welcoming woodland.
Then, with baleful hate, some monster tripped his hurried gait,
the shadows caught his foot.
Unyielding ground drew him down,
pulled to a helpless fall.
Terrors tore, wanting blood and gore,
his fear their ambrosia.
Far and near, jeer and cheer, they fed upon his trembling fear.
No past now; no memory, only terror…
Creatures called from all around as evil held him to the ground,
the awful darkness closing in.
Blood and tears on cherub cheek, and evil fed upon the meek.
There was only now the wintery night…
Then she was there and, all at once, the world was made aright.
His fearsome foes, they shrank away, destroyed by her might.
The cool air warmed within her arms, the darkened world alight.
His hurt, she banished with a kiss and freedom from the night.
Off towards home she carried him, wrapped kindly and so tight.
Her loving heart, it reached to him and softly said, “Goodnight.”
