I pray for beauty and
burnt paper rots between my teeth.
Fire falls beneath my eyes
reaches around and twists my spine
as it carves a shadow to
bloom a rose of oil and dirt,
I wonder why this
ritual has to hurt.
I think
I’ve worked the wrong
magic, or said the wrong spell,
Time and Silence will never tell
Shorn straw and silk
frame my face and sweep
past my jaw, left to swing
left to grow to sway
to and fro, and to
fall by and by.
I wonder why I try,
why I poke and pry things
from this torn and tattered lullaby,
It hums and pushes up through
my skin, finds defiance
in my twisted limbs, shaking hands
blank blazing eyes,
mouth twisted to pull a line
of defeat tight across my skin.
I am not a silly ephemeral thing,
I know that beauty lies and that truth dies
And that all the lovely things
will fade and rot away
slowly will they all decay and
seek a place to crawl away.
This song has been sung
by many a woman, many a girl
not just by myself, not just by her.
(I hold a princess mirror
and my greasy fingerprints sully the handle
and suddenly, without warning
transformation and metamorphosis
become cruel words
paid to play on the tip
of my tounge as they drag past my teeth,
those rotting away or sparkled to shine.)
And far away but closer then you’d think
a man sits in a tower high above the city
strewn with garbage
a soundscape scraped clean of pity
feeling the softly lit vibrations,
humming up to the tenth floor
his is the third door
on the left.
He dreams his dreams and
sticks them on her face
ties her hands with stinging nettle
and delicate, amazing lace
to shrink her like a doll
in his minds eye.
And in doings such as these
a terrible crime goes unnoticed
a terrible song storms the seas.
And those
other women who have
always been other or either
cackle and howl and raise their hands
and scream at the passers by,
beauty will die
so hold it forever
beauty will die
so hope for it never
buy my powders
buy my creams
this is your face my dear
and these are your dreams,
tied to nothing,
revealing nothing.
I listen and look as I stomp
and bounce my feet in loud quiet boots
toss my hair to tangle in the wind,
taste the sin gathering in the clouds.
I shrug my jeans to my hips,
check my my lipstick, check for rips
or other cracks in my composure,
I shudder in the cold and frown
at the exposure.
I know I must take part
I know that beauty can be art.
But beauty dies,
and everthing lies
as do you, as do I.
We lie stifly, softly
in our pillboxes, rooms,
webs, mazes, cradles and flowerbeds.
(We plant something in our pockets
and pull up nothing, no spark, no color,
but what of it?)
We continue as we’ve always done
capturing a moment, we trip, we fall,
we maul the others and shew them away.
We run to the edge of a cliff
overhanging the sea.
Some of us jump to find
a you or to loose a me.
But whatever we find
on the ocean floor
will be ours, and unlike
beauty it will be ours forever more.