Book I – The Solitary Peak
In twilight’s hush, where moonlight weeps
And silence clings to crag and steep,
A man once fled from world below—
Johnny Kaufman, worn and slow.
He climbed to heights where winds forget,
To live alone, his soul reset.
The world had burned him, scarred and raw,
So here he stayed, apart from law.
Each night, a song would thread the air,
Not bird, nor wind, nor mortal prayer.
In language lost to ear and time,
It rang—a hymn, a mournful chime.
For three long nights it gently played,
A siren tune in twilight's shade.
And Johnny, though of trembling heart,
Felt drawn to where the echoes start.
But courage was not his to wield,
His past a grave he’d never sealed.
So cowardice became his shield—
Yet still the song refused to yield.
Till one dark hour, deep in dream,
The melody began to scream.
Not from the hills, nor from the breeze,
But from within his walls with ease.
He leapt from bed, a man half-dead,
With ghostly whispers in his head.
He tiptoed forth on creaking floor
And dared to near the kitchen door.
The singing paused—then rose anew,
A voice alone, but rich and true.
And through the door’s uncertain slit,
He saw the shape, unearthly lit.
A man—or thing—in form alone,
Ten feet tall, of flesh and bone.
Bald and bent, its head leaned out,
To sing into the night, devout.
But when John called—a meek “Hello?”—
The being let its true self show.
It bent backward with grace and spite,
Defying rules of man and night.
Its neck, a serpent's coil of bone,
Twisted round to claim its throne.
Its eyes met his through crack and door-
And Johnny saw himself no more.
The song returned in velvet tones,
That sank through flesh, to blood and bones.
He floated, numb, in colors strange,
In dreamlike peace that felt deranged.
But peace gave way to howling shrill,
A scream to test the strongest will.
He fought the dream, he slammed the door,
He barred it fast, but heard no more
Than banging fists and clawing dread—
A demon’s song inside his head.
He screamed, he cried, he bled, he broke,
And passed out cold beneath its yoke.
Book II – Echoes in the Flesh
At dawn he woke—no clothes, no pride,
With only ghosts to sit beside.
His body bare, his mind undone,
He feared the night had truly won.
Memories long locked away
Returned with dread to haunt the day:
The priest, the pain, his brother's fall,
The silence that had swallowed all.
Skyler, gone to rope and grief—
A life snuffed out beyond belief.
Their parents, offered coin to cope,
Had traded justice in for hope.
A wound like his, so deep, so wide,
Could never quite be pushed aside.
So Johnny, aging, frail and high,
Sought normalcy beneath the sky.
With **** and fruit he held his ground,
And wrote the things that spun around.
He vowed to leave the beast alone—
What good’s the truth when joy is gone?
Yet pain persists in phantom form,
Like winter’s chill that outlasts storm.
And every night the song returned,
And through his veins, illusion burned.
He watched the moon, he watched the hill,
He prayed to gods he couldn’t feel.
For answers, not to ease the past,
But just to know what he’d outlast.
Each time he heard the song’s refrain,
It brought him peace, then brought him pain.
Book III - The Baptism of the Unseen
Years had passed since chapel’s lie,
Where innocence was left to die.
He’d dreamt of space, of stars and flight,
But priests had turned his day to night.
He'd once lit candles with delight,
Now shadows swallowed every light.
One Sunday, as the pews did fill,
A trick replaced his gentle will.
A hooded man, a sudden blow,
A bag, a fall, and down below.
Strapped and bound in dungeon’s lair,
His breath met only soured air.
And from the dark a whisper crept—
A sermon vile, a vow unkept.
“John the Baptist, would you try—
To cleanse my soul before I die?”
The voice asked low, then nearer came,
And marked the boy with blood and shame.
A drip, a breath, a ***** of light—
Then violence wrapped in robes of white.
They took his flesh, they broke his form,
And left his soul a tattered storm.
The Church, in crimson clothed and veiled,
Paid the silence, justice failed.
Skyler chose to end the song,
And Johnny wandered lost and long.
But even trauma, sharp and wide,
Could not erase the man inside.
Book IV – The Song Returns
Now older, bent, with beard grown wild,
He watched each night like frightened child.
He laid his traps, he lit his flame,
He gave his torch a sacred name.
But on the eve the creature came,
It set the coop and fowl aflame.
The sky lit up with ash and red,
The song returned to raise the dead.
It lured him to the spring below,
Where waters steam and moonlight glows.
And there the beast did finally show—
Its voice now soft, and deathly low.
They danced, they fought, they clashed and fell,
And Johnny knew this song too well.
He ran, he cried, through brush and tree,
But still it sang its litany.
A hymn for pain, for wounds unhealed,
For truths that time cannot conceal.
The beast, the priest, the song, the flame—
All part and piece, all one in name.
Epilogue – The Last Note
So if you climb the mountain’s face,
And find that quiet, haunted place—
Beware the song that rides the night,
And never trust the pale moonlight.
For Johnny's tale is not yet done,
He walks the dusk, he shuns the sun.
His name, half-lost, is sung in fear:
“The man who heard the song too near.”
And still he waits, in torch’s glow,
For answers he may never know.