The Shadow Rider | Teen Ink

The Shadow Rider

September 14, 2010
By Mjsskate BRONZE, Alta, Wyoming
Mjsskate BRONZE, Alta, Wyoming
4 articles 0 photos 1 comment

Favorite Quote:
Be Yourself, Everyone Else is Already Taken-Oscar Wilde


As midnight dawned,
Darkness settled serene,
A pond was calm,
On the moon swept scene,

Not a shadow glimmered,
Nor a vision shone,
Silence reigned,
On its kingly throne,

The coo of a dove,
A shuffling deer,
All unheard of,
To the untrained ear,

A ripple quivers,
In the now disturbed dark,
A figure glimmers,
Moving smooth as a shark,

Leaning over a horse,
Galloping at full speed,
Who knows what course?
He embarks, what deed,

Stealth up a hill,
A silent ascent,
The main attention until,
The rider is absent,

The rider is gone,
Not a trace here,
The silence wrong,
A very odd feel,

Quick as a bullet,
Sharp as a knife,
Everything’s quiet,
On that strangely still night,

The rider does not remain,
Everything returns to the norm,
The silence settles again,
And once more becomes warm,

Everything’s still,
Nothing seems out of place,
Yet the rider, the thrill,
The vision without a face,

Your mind keeps speaking,
Of the questions you yearn,
What quest was he seeking?
Will he ever return?

The questions are slowing,
The night returns to its state,
But the rider is still going,
Galloping toward his unknown fate.


The author's comments:
I was trying to think of a gift to give a friend for her birthday, and I remembered that she loved horses. As I began to write this, the words just started to flow from my pen, and they didn't stop. For a moment, I felt like I was the rider, the leather creaking as the horse galloped, the hooves making no sound. I wanted people to question the poem, try to discover the secret behind the rider. I wanted them to pretend they were in the riders shoes, galloping to who knows where. That was what I thought when I wrote this, that is what I dreamed when I wrote this, that is what I felt when I wrote this. I wanted the page to come alive in the language of unspoken words, and by the grace of God, it did.

Similar Articles

JOIN THE DISCUSSION

This article has 0 comments.