My Love Lies Bleeding (Part I)
My love lies bleeding among the meadowbeauties, purple,
entangled by hairy caltrop around her delicate feet and ankles. Climbing upward,
its thistled fruit prick my fingers and palms; as I unsnarl the dodder from her full
lips, its stems strengthen around her sultry paps and loins, and the binds tighten
around her slender arms and hands, forced to the base of her back. I strip their
adherence from leeching upon her naked form, all the while cursing myself
within, and the puncturevines mysteriously vanish at her side.
I see the small spikes have left their marks. Then, I unveil her face
hidden by her tresses in a blue mist. My heart pounds for her; my eyes rush like
the nearby stream, and my bare body collapses upon her with a firm embrace.
From where did this evil come? To where did those spiny heads go? What
opportunity did they find to rush upon her? For my love never trembled or
tottered; she was never in idleness. She is young and beautiful, but now my love
lies dying among the meadow rues, the ravens walkaway. Onlook the
meadowsweets and the lark, who consoles my lovesick heart, as I prepare to
gather up her limp body.
Folding her arms across her breast, I cradle her neck and crown of
black curly locks with my left arm, and with my right arm under her sculptured
legs, I lift her out of the soft furrow. The colorful ribbons we had tied in her hair
bounce and sway as I walk the distance to gently lay her figure upon the altar (the
same altar to which she had been led to me) coiled with ornamental shrubs of
flowers in cymes, snowdrops and aster florets.
Within the garden's border of thornless rose bushes, I wash her body
with the evening dew fallen upon their petals, likened to silk cloths. Longingly
and lovingly, I wail before her on my kness; gazing upon her, coupled with the
heady scent of jasmine, I am held captive there, but urgency frees me to rise and
leave her body well-gaurded by an array of gladioluses, amaryllis and
sansevieria.
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