[Certain]

The town was off limits. That much was certain.
So Benton obviously couldn't help but lust to search it.
Drawing dusk as curtain, he whisked from under sheets,
slipped on dungarees and even left a running furnace.
No one had to know. He'd built up trust on purpose,
and despite his rush of yearning, he still was hushed and nervous.
The twisted staircase creaked like the crickets underneath,
but as he slivered from the tree, no one so much as heard it.

The town was off limits. That's what the elders told them.
They'd sell their coal for smelted gold, an otherwise reluctant purchase.
But the town had held beholden, so it's best to trust the sermons,
and the people of the trees shared belief in sheltered omens.
Not Benton, though. He lived for the rush of learning
and had overheard one of his dad's friends discuss the urban.
At 16, with something stirring, he had soon built up the nerve and
laid down a plan to scout the land out beyond this crusted curtain.

The gate was screened, so he scraped through a thicket rut
and bit his tongue through pricks and cuts as he escaped the scene.
The woods were dark. He knew them well and made his flee.
Blind, he braced with trees but hit a branch and scraped his knee.
The lights were coming into focus, through the brush he strained to see
the budding residentials and smoke stacks that swayed with breeze.
And there it was, the towering point of the town's famous cathedral.
Benton gazed at its steeple and hungered more to grace its seats.

He stepped with superstition on to the freshly paven streets.
His plan had been made for weeks. The avenue was dim, and
yet he practiced, drew his mission: First left, then straight for three,
and as he strained his feet, the church came into his vision.
Silence. The door was heavy and thudded closed behind him.
Candles everywhere. The flames would leap, the only lighting,
they helped expose pius, those there to meditate and read.
"Welcome, son." A man's voice. "Join us and take a knee."
"Oh, hello, sir. I'm sorry," Benton said plaintively,
"I didn't mean to disturb anyone or break the peace."
"Don't be silly. Come, now. All are welcome. Pray with me."
Benton followed the man to row of candles laid in threes,
but as he bent his wounded leg, he felt the pain release.
"Gah!" Benton bolted out of his crouch and displaced the scene,
taking out a stand of candles as the others gazed so hatefully.
The noise was loud. The overhead lights displayed his deed:
A mess of wax, burns, mud and sacrilege betrayed his breed.

"Who are you?" The man's vocal tone was changing quick.
"Why did you come here? You tree rat! You filthy paganist!"
Benton froze at first, but his mind was made to split,
so he dashed back through the heavy door and escaped the fists.
His gait was swift, so he reached the village, creaked back upstairs
and played it slick, laying in his toasty bed while cracking, scared.

The village elders had sworn to protect their own for all its costs,
so by the time Benton was found, the townspeople were mid-holocaust.
They strung him up on one of the last trees standing that would hold,
and pretended this all was over something more than coal.