Do you remember that nightmare I had
while I lived a dream some years ago?
It dripped out of my head
and into your mouth.
You spat bitterness,
ice pierced my ankles, welding them.
Under the thick night
I opened my mouth to call,
found my tongue cloven, hissed.
I opened my heart to laugh,
thirty shards of silver shredded my throat.
I opened my heart to love,
found it staked to my womb.
O lord of the dark,
forbid the cruel children of the night.
They bind my eyes and split my mouth.
Wake me, twinned son of darkness!
Crouch with me till the clement dawn sights us,
singing your song:
“Gaze into the mirror of your tears and see
not woman, but you, and be.
Dance your tears to frenzy,
hold your heart in your hand,
swallow the sun,
and a thousand nights will come
and you shall sleep
while memory and hurt couple
without you. Wake at their clamorous death
and love again the fantastic night and its black prince.”
Seduced to flight by your song,
across a mountain height I ran,
feet sparking the air...
and jumped,
my face to the sun, my wings spanning oceans.
But as I began to soar, my man Medusa laughed
and, in a fitting requiem to my felled flight,
swung low and shut my astonished mouth
with a Judas kiss.
