Survivor
His mother and father went out on the river and never came back
(But he’s still here)
She went over the Sea, wounded too deeply by orc attack
(But he’s still here)
We cannot get out, drums in the deep took his kinsfolk
(But he’s still here)
They fled o’er the bridge, and he fell in shadow and black smoke
(They’re still here)
Their people are fading, but still here they linger like old dreams
(They’re still here)
He found him fading, and laid him to rest on the white streams
(They’re still here)
They’re gone, gone, forgotten; he lingers in malice and hungering
(He’s still here)
They’re all growing tree-ish, but he persists watching and pondering
(He’s still here)
His grief unrestrained; that Spider took his dearest Master
(But he’s still here)
Many went to the Door; only few walked away from disaster
(But he’s still here)
Grief consumed mother, the brother by water, the father by fire
(But he’s still here)
Her parents died young, the uncle who raised her was wounded dire
(But she’s still here)
And when he returns to his study and books and his quaint room
(He’s still here)
A part of him’s lost; it died in the shadow of Mount Doom
(But he’s still here)
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