Self-esteem slithers away
And my towering façade
Cascades for the gutters

A filthy demise of exploding mortar
Swells around the beloved
Coloring, their paths in the horror

Undone
By the rust and neglect
By the sheer force of strangers
All the weight they uncaringly impose

Too little, too late
The beams rattle
Overrun with my rot
To gush forth
In a torrent of earth, blood and steel

Too late are the beloved
In their wailing despair
For the fuse was alight
In a shroud, long ago