DARK

You feared the light for
the shadows it cast.
Yet, you retreated
into the dark,
into an incorporeal guise
for the archaean
sorrow scrawled upon
your bones.
You engraved its pulse 
upon your skin,
its bloom rapidly shrinking
from life,
parched for want of
flowing warmth
and fleshy ballast,
bleeding lines
painstakingly scored,
perfectly parallel,
like the bars of your
inner confinement.
Crimson wounds blossomed,
shrivelled,
paled to cold white scars,
soon a tangled mass,
livid weeds in the
garden of your soul,
leaching the joy that should
have been its bequest.
In vain I sought to dull the
invisible blade
that slashed at your heart
from within,
consuming your reflection,
feeding your demons,
these arbiters of your baptism
of unceasing denial.
I shall never know the lives you
lived in your dreams,
for you have erased every trace
of the past and present.
I shall not seek you in your
wonted haunt, I have not
the stomach for such a dark.

© 2016 Lily's Verse

Lilium Candidum

Image source: aarwungallery.com

Artist: Margarita Georgiadis