There is an old stone grey and
weathered by years bygone,
beyond the fence and through
the gates all rusted and cold.
A stone that weeps remembrance
of a kind and aged man long passed,
who sleeps now beneath in a bed
of wood and a cover of leaf and soil.
But a stone disturbed to slant,
for each starlit night he walks again,
his ragged breaths and lurching
steps beat a staggering march.
The splintered bed cast aside,
his epitaph abandoned to sand,
as past the fence he wanders slow,
searching for something long he lost.
They say he drinks the blood of
those he finds, rats and fools, but
none known have vanished and ever
he returns to that earthen respite.
Come dawn his eyes have closed,
the soil settled calm as if unturned,
The only clue to his waking turn;
a drop of sparkling pale blood.