The Wayside Inn

Crackling bolts streak the stormy night;
in sleeting rains the bamboo trees flail.
Razored wounds 'neath my armor sting;
staggering steps leave their bloody trail.

On my trusted sword and scabbard
with my waning strength I lean and stand.
There is no stalking evil my heart fears
with its righteous lacings in my hand.

The down trodden and innocent
against tyranny I will defend.
No regrets dwell within my heart
in peace I can face my dying end.

Wiping my blurred and rain filled eyes,
a blue flamed fireball hovers about.
To my enemies and evil spectres,
my blade's righteous sheen awaits I shout.

Lightning claps and thunderous roars
seem to reprimand my words of spite.
My weakened state fails me to see
what beholds in the blue aura's light.

Weathered boards and roof tiled with slate;
an old sign reveals a wayside inn.
Through its shoji doors come a warming glow
with roasting fares wafting from within.

Into the steaming onsen mists
the blue fireball slowly disappears.
Out from the sliding shoji door
a lantern holding geisha appears.

Lithe but her strength had guided me
'neath the mapled lintel of the door.
Weary, I finally collapse unto
the inn's warm tatami matted floor.

Visions of rape and plunder swirl
in wakes tyrannical warlords leave.
On my snorting steed I gave chase;
my avenging sword gave no reprieve.

Atrocities tattoo my soul
with their inks of indelible taint.
Now flashing back across my reeling mind
into a darkened abyss I faint.

Awakened by a lightning clap
on a flowery futon I lie.
Girthed about in a clean loincloth;
a steaming towel cleanses my thigh.

For my sword's familiar lacings
my instinctive senses seek and find.
Gesturing hands assure no harm will come;
her touches easing my grasp and mind.

Two cups of warm sake she pours
from a blue flowered porcelain flask.
We toast in silent gratitude
for questioning words need not be asked.

I savor returning memoirs
the sake's warmth and skewered fares bring.
Falling tears soften my war hardened heart
from the lullabies of home she sings.

The night passes with wine and song,
outside the storm is still far from calm.
Succulent fares return my strength,
wounds healing in medicinal balms.

I see her cheeks now flushed with wine
candle lamps reveal her true beauty.
Cleavage of curving breasts and inner thighs
through loosened robes my staring eyes see.

She senses my thoughts of longing
for a night with a woman to share.
She unpins her tortoise shell comb
releasing down her long flowing hair.

Containing not my urge to stare
nor the hardness engorging flows make.
Only my hand or her sweet moistened warmth
can relieve my loins full lusting ache.

Her parted lips reach down on mine;
falling sashes opening her robe.
Moans as she gropes 'neath my loincloth;
softly gasping from my sensual probes.

Her two hands barely encircling;
my exuding flows tantalizes.
Swollen girth fully engorged with passion;
surrounds her lips and fantasizes.

Lightning flashes expose her hand
beneath her raised straddling hips guiding.
Thunder drowns her whimpers and gasps,
down to my hilt's curls slowly sliding.

Squeezing upward each turgid inch
plunging down and gyrating her hips.
Uninhibited and quickened tempos;
weepings flow from her mound's fleshly lips.

Arches and sways her breasts to tempt,
begging to take them ravishingly.
Imminent is ecstasy's peak;
her hips now surging feverishly.

Her nails raking across my back,
like lightning bolts I explode and fill.
She whimpers and moans with long drawn squeezes
ebbing like thunder in distant hills.

Collapsing together in arms
in the storm's quieting aftermath.
Still clinging in the fragrant night
from jasmines' blooms 'long a garden path.

My wounds and emotions mending
all healing comes from within she knows.
Embracing me in her perfumed bosom
restful sleep brings the night to a close.

My eyes wake to a golden dawn;
Mejiros warbling their lilting songs.
I search about for my maiden
already whom my heart deeply longs.

Cobwebs net the night's fiery hearth;
futon and straw tatami mats worn.
Donning my armor with my sword unsheathed,
I seek for her in the early morn.

Morn's breezes clear the onsen's mist
to show my eyes a flowery bed.
A lone river rock gravestone stands
amidst day-lilies of blue and red.

Its mossy hewn epitaph tells
a story about a geisha's ghost.
Who haunts in shadows of the.wayside inn
after dark where she was once its host.

The hairs on my arms slowly stand
so are those on my stiffening nape.
Reading on her words console me
comforting me like a warming cape.

Centuries past to her village
came drunken horsemen hell-bent and crazed.
Plundered their rice harvest and raped their young
to the ground their evil torches razed.

Now when the nightfalls she appears
to strangers as a fireball of flames.
The righteous see her flames in blue
in demon red for hearts evil claimed.

Passage to the righteous she gives,
leaving rested from their inn's night stay.
To the unrepentant in evil delve
she will haunt till in a grave they lay.

She has given my heart closure
revealed through her epitaph in stone.
She will always dwell in my heart;
I'll never again feel all alone.

Burning incense of thanks I leave
beneath her gravestone before I go.
I vow to return to her inn someday
where the blue and red day-lilies grow...