The people were walking around the town,
Oblivious to their terrible fate,
The little children jumping up and down,
By the time they realised, it was too late.

We were strolling lazily and looked aloft,
The sky was a piercing blue overhead,
We talked of days yet to come in voices soft,
Amidst the vibrant hues of the garden bed.

At first it was naught but a cloud of smoke,
A pale smudge in the cloudless summer sky,
But then it grew as if a dragon had woke,
I was the first to realise, the first to cry.

Then the red hot lava came pouring forth,
Surging down the remains of the mountainside,
Some stayed put, some tried to flee up North,
But rich or poor, young or old, all men died.

I died warm in his arms, that fateful day,
In the ruins of what was once Pompeii.