She sat in dusk, in silent gloom,
her gaze as hard as stone.
A bleeding heart, a crimson plume,
was fastened to her bone.
An arrow soft, yet sharp with fate,
had pierced her painted skin.
“O Love,” she said, “you came too late –
you left no light within.”
Her voice was glass, her breath was cold,
her head inclined with dread:
“Love whispered sweet, but waxed so bold –
now all I loved is dead.
He swore to bring eternal spring,
yet winter he bestowed.
His kiss became a shadowed sting
that burned where roses grow’d.”
The mirror once her joy and grace,
reflected now a ghost.
No stars were left to light her face,
no dreams she once could boast.
“I saw the world through lover’s eyes –
now I see through the scar.
A veil of blood, where silence cries,
and all things distant are.”
No tears she shed, but deeper yet
a darker drop was wept.
And where it fell, the floor was wet
with secrets she had kept.
“I loved,” she sighed, “and that is why
my soul was made undone.
My heart beat once beneath the sky –
but now, it beats for none.”
She sat, her gown in ruins lay,
the light began to fade.
The lamp flickered and slipped away,
as if it were afraid.
And those who passed, they saw her not,
but felt her sorrow near –
a ghost of love, a bleeding thought,
that chills the heart with fear.
