Checkmate

Compressed under violet, grey, and black sky,

I stand atop this solitary stone fortress

that grips to the mountain.

The peak emerges slightly above

the lively, biting shadows,

shaped into mechanical fog covering,

filling the invisible base of the alp

and billowing like binding claws stretched

around the rest of the world.

Beneath my feet, a chess board resides.

The dancing torch flames perform

their ritual on the squares

of  crimson and dead black.

I stand as a lone king

facing an absent enemy.

I chance the frontlines for ghosts

of the yet-to-be.

No brothers in arms take their places.

They, too, are phantoms feeding fear.

My turn is yet to come,

in this specter massacre reflected

only by scaling shadows named for Mt. Iago,

warping earth and ash as it rises.

I make my first move,

and my last,

as the mountain collapses,

darkness clawing me

into

eternity.