Shadows In The Darkland Poem by Frank McEleny

Into the shadows of the dark land
Where the roaring lion roams free
Never to return to the world of innocence
This cynical dimension has forever trapped me

For years I wandered in the twilight
Voices of the world echo unclear
This is a place of abandoned desolation
Forever ruled by shame and fear

How is it that these world's co-exist in time
A child in one, a slave to the other
Surviving daily in a colorless jungle
Yet sentenced forever to continually suffer

A childless child in a demanding world
Longing to return to a different time
To a place of warmth and sweet embrace
Oh to laugh again, how sublime

There were times when I thought I had found the way
I could almost feel the sun on my face
But just at that time, the lion did pounce
And I ran screaming back into that place

And so I walked on, chains pulling me down
Seemingly going nowhere
Yet I was being pulled towards an enormous pit
And I did not have the strength to care

And before I knew it I was falling
Having finally gone over the edge
I was grasping and scraping and calling out
Before I came to a stop on a ledge

I looked down and I could see the bottom
It was the bottom of the bottomless pit
I looked at myself, I was covered in filth
And I said to myself, this is it

I looked up and I could see no light
And I cried out, oh God help me!
And in an instant, His Hand came down
And before I knew it I was free

I was out of the pit and standing on the Rock
I could feel the sun on my face
Never again to walk in the shadows of the Dark land
But to live forever in a continual embrace.