Sometimes she’s Persephone
Or just another Ophelia floating in the river
And she falls like morale
While he rises like dissent
All intent becomes meaningless as war
and laughable as justice
Everything given is a prayer left unanswered
And the only words left are empty metaphors
Every morning the Promethean heart regenerates
Lays poised on its sleeve for daily breaking
Down by the river’s edge she waits for a reason
trails a finger in the icy waters
Flirts with inevitable endings
Sometimes you have to die again
To remember what it hurts like to live
Sometimes you can sleep a life away
Wake to the scents of vanilla,smoke and fear
Sounds of a ragged heartbeat and a song
that will lose its meaning
Sometimes a heart stops on a doorstop
By light of a half moon and fire on a mountain
And you let the ghost of it burn into memory
Follow the contours of phantom hands and hesitant touch
An echo of reluctant longing
and heartbreaking sincerity of regret
Etched into permanence like a beautiful nightmare
There are days when she sits by the river’s edge
and thinks about sinking like a stone
becoming cold and dead again
Hoping someone will give her permission
You have to be careful what you wish for
One day he’ll give the signal and she’ll laugh
And slip beneath the waves like she was born to drown
Close her eyes and dream happy mermaid dreams
Hoping it’ll take this time
She’s always been so bad at dying
Back at the water’s edge he lingers
Watches her drift out to sea and smiles
Thinks he’s lucky to be free of her at last
Still, he must admit,she makes a very pretty corpse
He’s glad that he thought to bring the camera
He gets lonely sometimes…