Fall Of Night
And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all.
~Edgar Allan Poe, Masque of the Red Death
Open the last door
of the windowless room
to find the darkness.
Slender thrust of moonsword
through matted velvet musk
you are hollow as all the other
castings of Ouroboros
a black beam of my own sending,
shot scarlet with motes of self overlooked
by fevering dreams, the tart taste of
amanita on the tongue, red dotted white,
I put inside your gaping mouth.
The night knows as it closes
I am not a source of light
but the lens sent to break it.
Still you are so deathly
beautiful, cerise smile in the shiftspin
of the prism's red masque
throwing back mirror bright
throwing back mirror bright
all the carmine dazzle of darkness,
that I can’t look away from
the bloodshine in your eye; it
spills through the heart locked
heavy round my neck
drips in a tankard
skull white, ice cold
raised to the worms of your lips.
drips in a tankard
skull white, ice cold
raised to the worms of your lips.
Look—you lift your arm--
you seem to call me
deeper into the ruins
just
before the light
goes out.
February 2012
Posted for Open Link Night at dVerse Poets Pub
I'm ghosting tonight at the pub, where the party will be free of darkness decay and malign influences, and only poetry will have dominion over all.
Come join us.
Link in will be live from 3:00pm Tuesday to Midnight Wednesday, EST.
I'm ghosting tonight at the pub, where the party will be free of darkness decay and malign influences, and only poetry will have dominion over all.
Come join us.
Link in will be live from 3:00pm Tuesday to Midnight Wednesday, EST.
Header Image: Relic, posted by practicalowl on flickr
Shared under a Creative Commons 2.0 Generic License
Footer Image: Illustration from Masque of the Red Death, 1919, by Harry Clarke [Public domain], via wikimedia commons