By Eve Messervy
To be a woman is to be perfectly
destructive;
To be painted like Klimt
Bleeding gold
With a faint smile.
I met a woman who kept me asleep once,
Uttering such words
She made me cry.
She had not the gift of motherhood
Nor the touch of love,
Her hands were hard-worked,
her skin weathered.
She wore lines of lust and love
And torment
Tear burns beside her eyes like
companions to the lenses,
The mark of sorrow stained.
To be a woman is to be perfectly destructive
She said
Holding my hand as I slept
I see a sacred subtlety in the eyes of a women
A stone cold fire
burns the smell of florals
And feels like linen on naked skin.
Early morning beams of sun
decorate the sheets.
I open up my sore eyes
To an empty palm, I close my fist –
It dawns on me
As my reflection looks back
Into the tear burned eyes
Like companions, to my lenses.
My tyrant mind
Plays tricks with me
And dances like I used to dance
It conjures up the girls from Klimt
And bleeds gold
into my dreams.