Erskine Lake

A house of guns and swords and mounted game,

The welcome smell of panelled rooms of pine,

The Burgermeisters' home and Tanta's name

I can recall but not the covert sign

Of treachery that lay within those floors.

And O, the garden where we'd run and hide

And pluck the full and ripened fruit, the chores

My father's boundless energies applied

To ease the strain upon his elder kin.

At the age of four we were too young to know

Deceit and fraudulence as mortal sin

And played unconscious in the evening glow,

Wide-eyed saw the fish beneath the dock,

Swam delighted in the fairy lake

Open-mouthed watched the cuckoo-clock

Strike the hour and darkness overtake

The colourscape of sunset in the trees.

I recall the chuckle of laughter in her voice

And uncle's resonant call upon the breeze

To come inside and happily rejoice

At treasures known and new discoveries.

As all grew dark my father joined his friends

And rowed the lake in serenade to please

With music that our nature comprehends.

The residents heard wondrous melodies,

Songs their fathers sang in evening air,

Enchanting us in summer's mellow ease;

How could we know the falsehood dwelling there?

And as they aged, my father by their side,

Never asked a favour in return,

Exhausted from his labours still would ride

At their command to aid but never learn

Until too late their warped and wicked ways.

One day they called him to their cottage home,

Held his hand and told him of the days

Ahead when hunter Death would surely come.

In gratitude they soon would sign his name,

Bequeath to him their woodland dream they must.

Their trickery he never overcame,

The cruelty that used another's trust,

Abused the love he gave with inward glee

Embraced with joy yet offered the fatal blade

Behind a smiling face dealt misery

To those who fell within their darkness' shade.

In all our human perfidy there lies

A greater evil's force that taints the heart

And chokes the growing soul that would arise,

And once ensconced unlikely to depart

Such kindly hosts whose ways have welcomed him

And set a table filled with sin and greed

To satisfy each foul and dreadful whim

Attentive to his dark and lethal need.

Though pain replaced the joy he once had known

So deep the wound of human infamy,

He suffered their betrayal, yet alone

Lost not God's face in our humanity.