The world ends here in the grave,

The start of course was in palm rose,

Til' the heart beats faster to crave.

Lies in the mission, lies in the wave,

Promises with pitch, one sleeps in dose,

The world ends here in the grave.

The children pick out the pave,

To hum along as the sun froze,

Til' the heart beats faster to crave.

The world ends here in the grave,

At midnight, he clung to each prose,

Whispers lie where the world is enslaved.

Til' the heart beats faster to crave,

Eager to put out all broken hose,

We died a little with a face so brave.

In the bombarded shell they fade,

With a forlorn hope: cities posed,

The world ends here in the grave,

Til' the heart beats faster to crave.

— 8th June, 2024

. . . .

A villanelle (French verse) is a poem of nineteen lines, and which follows a strict form that consists of five tercets (three-line stanzas) followed by one quatrain (four-line stanza) with the first and third lines of the first stanza repeating alternately in the following stanzas. These two refrain lines form the final couplet in the quatrain. Villanelles use a specific rhyme scheme of ABA for their tercets, and ABAA for the quatrain.