Another prosery challenge at dVerse Poets.
Their prosery? A very short piece of poetry or flash fiction that tells a story with a beginning, a middle, and an end. It can be any genre you choose, but it does have a limit of 144 words. Somewhere within your story, you must include given lines without changing word order or adding any.
The lines to include this time around? A couple from Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Sleeper”
I pray to God that she may lie
Forever with unopened eye
Headstone
In a graveyard nearing dusk the groundskeeper came upon Death, leaning heavily on his knot gnarl anguish handled scythe as he knelt at an almost hidden, fallen stone, shunned, just outside the cemetery, alone, at the edge of a large forest. He wept quietly.
“Are you alright old man?”
Death was startled
“What?!” as he tried to stand
“No need. Pay your respects”
“Why don’t you shudder cold at the sight of me, cringe, run to escape who I am, maybe to you?”
“I know death. I have been here as long as you have searched … for your mother right? How did you know?”
“I had this inscribed in her stone I pray to God that she may lie forever with unopened eye hoping she would never see my shame and what I had become and wrought”
The groundskeeper said “Let’s walk my friend”
frankenberrysattic.com 
Eery! I like that you personified death in such a human way. That is something I don’t normally see.
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Thanks Melissa. I like to take those “personifying” trips.
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An interesting side of death. I like this
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Thanks so much Debi!!
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As a Swede, this reminds me so much of the film “The Seventh Seal”, with death visiting the knight…
“I have walked beside you for a long time”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4yXBIigZbg
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Will definitely have to check that out Bjorn, thanks!
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You make me feel sorry for Death.
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Well I just thought that we all have mothers, even Death.
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Indeed. 😊
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(Bjorn has already mentioned the 7th Seal). I love this, and the added note of accepting death is a powerful thought.
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Thank ya Paul. He may be a frightening character, the harbor of all ills and the end he brings but I always imagine him to be just like you and I. He just has a job to do.
https://frankenberrysattic.com/2022/04/05/angel-of-death-end-of-days-route-9-poughkeepsie/
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Indeed he does 🙂
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And I do have to set some time aside to watch the 7th Seal.
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