literacy exercise

these are the roads that take us to no rest
so much of time has passed since we were there
and still the tin signs in the village square
swing in the breeze as markers of our quest
for mental freedom and to know the jest
that causes laughter in this heavy air
we stand now at the border of old care
and wonder if we still can pass the test
another comes to name the old one brute
to tell us how we fail to reach the goal
since we have shown no force of honest will
in a place where all truth is absolute
and none who comes will ever depart whole
since what must heal must also in time kill