One opens as another closes
The Portals in one's life:

Red and fiery, Fires of War,
Flames of Anger and Heat that flaws -
Again the dead sprawl; broken stones,
Bodies crushed and fractured bones.

Blue and cold, Ice of Death,
Cracks and splits at Trumpet sound.
Severed Bridges spanned and bound
Again to rocks of Life.

Portal of Mortality
Closes in the end -
Two Gateways to Eternity
Lie before the Mortal's send.
Which one taken must be known
Before Lifebreath away has flown...

1 April 2003