What was written in stone

A marble slab disguised with leather and ink.

A vision, yes!

Surely the Muses sang to me,

but this stone lays still

while my chisel gathers dust.

I blinked and it melted to curving columns

akin to those that stretched from Babel to

Rome.

Will you be my Coliseum

withstanding the weather and wars?

or will you crumble as they did?

I watched in horror as it changed again.

A granite pillar with trembling radiance.

You whispered of promises and prophecies,

of worlds etched in stone.

I saw what it could be, but strained to understand.

Over again I watched it change.

Sandstone to

Jasper to

Bronze to

Jade.

I watched you stretch the promised scripture and crumble

before I gave you a name.

You left my hands covered in dust

and pages stained in rambling loops.

So I put you aside for another day.

"Tomorrow," I told myself.

"Tomorrow, or the next day."

or the next...

or the next...

until at last your promises turned tomb to stone

Withered and weathered with forgotten dates

but there at last, upon your face, was written a name.

"Unknown"