Paths

So where does this wonderous story begin?
Quite literally, the back of a school bus/
down the road/ at society's end.
A daily hour of respite while lost in a tome
before exiting into youthful, chaotic din.

The world that absorbed me and pulled me in
were the writings of White on Arthurian legend.
They took me to a place so far from my home
at the edge of the woods fore the great swamp's bend.

The swamp would one day help me blend in
and escape the sharp clutches of tyrannical kin.
The beginning of freedom and a lifetime to roam -
to discover the real world that I now lived in.

But on that fateful day, when it all would begin,
as the trees of the swamp did help me to blend,
a tortoise came forth from out of the loam
and before me would rest at the place I was in.

Like Merlyn's owl, a message could send,
so too a wisdom from my four legged friend
who carried around his fortress of home
as far as he dared around green glade's bend.

Not me, I swore, I would fly as the wind,
As the bird in the book - all the way to the end.
They'll catch me if burdened and slow to roam,
but in flight, no clutches would I ever fend.

So freedom was won - new life would begin
as I left the copse and the turtle therein
No more would the edge of the swamp be my home.
I flew and I flew; my own message to send.

But I never forgot the tortoises glen
and my flight from my past did come to an end.
Now I walk sure and I carry my home.
No more a flame that is blown by the wind.