“Love, which absolves no one beloved from loving,

seized me so strongly with his charm that,

as you see, it has not left me yet.

Love brought us to one death.”

― Dante Alighieri, Inferno

You feel cold here,

Slipping through my hands like orphan air.

The chalice of your soul is empty,

Every defense is plundered.

The moondust drips from your eyes,

Anguish is reflected in each chromatic orb.

Your lips are sinking like stones in mud

Disdaining the comfort of a lover’s sanctuary.

You’d rather taste a blade than a kiss,

The hemorrhaging of your soul

A more bearable offering than undressing your heart.    

Pitiful crimson bird,

Will you seek absolution?

One more lacerating rosary to purify a sinner’s shame?

Mercy cannot pour into a cracked vessel,

What a waste to spill perfume into deadwood.

You’re all dust and bones inside,

A mausoleum reeking of despair.

The vultures came with the hunter’s moon,

Picking at the marrow of your bone garden.

These new scars will join your macabre art,

Promise you’ll remember me by this one.

Oh little ruby cardinal,

I can see the fractured diamonds in your mind,

Your plumage is bathed in sanguine contempt.

The mourning dove keened thrice,  

Does he love me still?

You bought his life with soul shards,

You bore the lash to spare the traitorous raven.

Thirty pieces of silver did you offer me,

The price for every pound of ivory flesh.

What a great cost to pay as ransom,

The eternal aching of an unworthy heart.

Behold, the miasmic fruit of your love!

Alas, the rotting corpse of your compassion!

A crown of thorns suits you well,

There is beauty in your blasphemous devotion.

Poor misguided hatchling,

The fears of a lifetime are finally being realized.

You are fully known and yet fully despised,

Bound and branded in a cage of crucifixion.

Your corrupted veins are bleeding poison,

Watering dead flowers.

You’re every shade of the colors you despise.

Your fragile wings are broken at every joint,

But they refuse to be testaments to destruction.

The raven covered your shame with his quills,

The nest you built together endured the bite of winter.

The fury and hatred of my warring squalls,

Could not breach the walls of your sacred union.

The raven claimed your tattered pennons as his own,

Beating noble wings against all your accusers.

Fear not little fledgling,

For he loved you still.

He loves you still.