The Dragon Awake

The Dragon Awake

Ankhmar the Dragon at the threshold of his cave
surveys his world in the light of the sunrise
in a bold new year, his four hundred and seventy-ninth.
Far below, his neighbour village still twinkles
with the festive lights of celebration, another year,
an innocent hope of a better time as the world turns
to greet its future, bright with promise. Fine for them,
thinks Ankhmar from the depth of his aged soul,
weary from his flaring nostrils to the tip of his pointed tail,
for ephemeral beings of the here and now,
all noise and light in their brief moment of life.
But for dragons each succeeding year means only
the eternal round, a coin here, a crown there,
a growing hoard, a meaningless treasure
to serve a need for endless acquisition,
and still the aged body decays, the scales dull,
the fire low in the belly, the eyesight dim,
every day to ponder on the longevity of his race.
Oh for an errant knight to venture upon his feeble path,
so to prod him thankfully to an end of this ennui,
but damsels are scarce and as like as not these days
to wound much deeper than a rescuing clod.
Vain desire indeed, this hankering for an early death.

But wait, he feels the need to stretch his forelimbs wide
and doing so, a splitting sound betrays the rip of skin
beneath his torso. With energy renewed and taloned claws,
he tears the break still wider, then proceeds
to discard faded, ancient carapace until at last
he steps out from the dragon he was and so becomes
Ankhmar the Renewed, fitting transformation to wrest
this shining self from its disillusioned cage.
In all the ages he had forgotten the healing force
that shedding brings to a tired existence.
He greets the world with a roar like thunder,
“Good morning all and a Happy New Year!”


Line Count: 35
Free Verse
A poem about a dragon and shiny new year.
Use these Words and bold them in your poem: coin, cave, new, sunrise, time.