16 December 2009

Featured poem, "For M"

I might continue this trend, of featuring brilliance as time allows. This poem is not by me, but I am so very proud of her I must share it. - CC


by Christina Vincent


You leave me at a loss for words, which,
for me,
is bad business. You see,
words are all I know. Words
are how I know you. Still,
the memory of fire and solid darkness
leaves me shaking. Shivering.
So cold. You burn
so very cold.
Glowing as gold in a vault underground,
buried deep,
deep below
our feet, where
the sun cannot shine, and
the wind cannot
touch. Movement,
still and resonating. Your movement is
sound,
the toll of a bell to call the gods, the
thrum of a dying heart as it bleeds
onto the parched grave dust beneath.
What sorts of trees grow in
blood-soaked graveyard soil? What sort of
fruit would those trees bear?
A pomegranate, so
thick and juicy red, the seeds to settle
in the pit of one’s stomach to anchor
to Persephone, and you can
never go back again. A muse,
a demon, a lover sweet and deadly, a monster
of such exquisite beauty, wrapped in
shimmering gilded robes of poetry and caresses.
One bite, one slit, one
cut
and everything is blackness. Everything is stars,
and everything sinks into arms
like stone.
A precious, feral gift. A dreaming
of a time not of this world
spoken in a language long dead
with tongues that know dialects
we’ve never heard.
We used to throw ourselves on slabs of rock and beg
for a taste of your voice, for your sweetened
devil’s breath in our ear
with whispers,
soft whispers
that tempt madness from dark corners.
A precious thing
as thick as blood
and slick as ice
that burns and bites like hellfire swathed
in empty darkness where nightmares whisper.
A muse.
Vampire.
Demon.
Incubus.
Fuel another fevered dream
and let these tiny shivering hands
offer up another piece
of that twisted silver dreamscape
that holds stories together.


3 comments:

Anonymous said...

To Christina via Carrie:

Beautiful and alluring. And I can't help but notice and appreciate the Miltonesque sentence structure.

Kudos

Anonymous said...

A passionate tribute.

Keith said...

That was wonderful. I loved reading it. Thanks for sharing that with us.