Whispers and tattoos.

It's time to ask a task of you,
Write me a verse and tattoo it to,
Skin that no one can ever see,
No one, not one, not even me.

Ink it in feeling, pitch it with love,
Stroke it with fingers bare and ungloved,
So that in sleep I'll seek its touch,
And when out of dreams, I'll miss it much.

Tailor the letters, fashion the words,
Forge the phrases into my girth,
Let them whisper what you won't say,
Words of passion, caution and sway.

Now I ask a task of you,
Make me a necklace of morning dew,
Crown me with secrets made of pearls,
And remind me why I was made a girl.

Doorbells and date nights.

Dirty nails.
Pristine clothes.
White, too, and silk, with bows.
Black leather boots.
A riding crop.
A studded bra.
A pink jock cup.

A date! At last, a date.
Chocolate, maybe? Or Chardonnay.
A tux? A dress.
Black or red?
I'd go with black...
But red's a Siren!
Red it is. Hot attack.

Long, curly hair.
Buzz cut, tailored with care.
Two cute?
Too cute.
Blonde? Brunette?
Perfect is insecure,
I like defects.

Shoes. Of course, the shoes!
Haha, why not?
Hooker heels.
Soft leather loafers,
with sheepskin insoles.
Shaved legs?
nah. Razor burn.

Detract! Distract!
What a mess.
The doorbell's ringing.
I wonder...
is my date...
a guy?
or a girl?

The jock cup,
for the pretty lady,
The studded bra
for the alpha male.
But what if...
it's both?
like...
me.

Crazy talk.

I walked headfirst into a gate,
And fell, distressed into the drapes,
And saw, outside, a cat with hair,
And a furry man with two eclairs.

Beside him lay a faceless dog,
Who indulged in wordless monologue,
And ate, presumably, the cat,
Who'd vanished while we'd had this chat.

The man, instead, ate eclairs both,
And made the dog shed off her coat,
And added to his furry skin,
A pelt of finest, canine lint.

The naked dog then ate the man,
Grew fangs, fur and attention span,
And earned a surely feline face,
And along with that, canine disgrace.

Certainly, something was amiss,
What respectable dog would meow and hiss?
And what the deuce possessed her throat?
Her barks came out like wordy gloats!

And then, alas, the dog had died!
Her abrupt demise all sense defied,
Her stomach was twisted all in knots,
And the people claimed it was the pox.

Some argued that she had been beaten,
Some said it was something she'd eaten,
Perhaps it was the cat with hair?
But methinks it was the damned eclairs.

Hunger

Two bits of burning, blazing coal
Sweep over heaps of offal wealth,
Consuming all that baser gold,
In a yawning gaze where Hunger dwells.

Eating years, and now in her twelfth,
A girl--a rat?--a vulture-child,
Slave to stealth and fading health,
Rotting apples ate and thus defiled,
What human nature she had left.

Beside her sits a broken doll,
Tied to her spindly, bony fingers,
As if unanchored would devolve.
And about her, putrid perfume lingers,
As a scented sign of her coming fall.

From the sky, in mocking rain,
Pour dregs of wine and liquored relish,
Plates of yester-dinner remains,
Noodles in oodles and half-eaten fish,
And the girl below a meal attains.

She grasps her food in a bone-grown bowl,
Imprisons her life in her hand-walled cage,
That one mouthful can free her soul,
If she opened her fingers, a lifetime she'll age,
--if she let it slip through her bone-grown bowl.

But Hunger decides, not her, not Him,
And she holds on tighter to her bite,
Raises to her lips and her hunger dims,
One more day she's eaten, one more night,
She'll live till it rains again: wine on a whim.

War

Sit down, Madame, take a seat!
Stay your hands and cross your feet,
You see those drops of crystal rain?
They're tears, madame, tears of pain.
The clouds thunder, with rage replete,
While the skies light up in white defeat.

A storm, my doll, a storm is here!
The clash and clatter of woes is near!
The swirling red among the white,
Is naught but blood shed in the fight,
But hush, now, don't cry, my dear,
You disrespect them with your fear.

You see the frothing ribbons there?
Those once were men, tall and fair,
Now all that's left is pus and flesh,
Poisoned, speared and cut afresh,
What? You find it hard to bear?
My dove, you're yet to have your share.

Can you hear the wailing cries?
It's the sound of man as he dies,
And as life leaks out from cracking skin,
The killed becomes the killer's kin,
And the fear you feel is but a lie,
Do you know what it's like to die?

Do you know what it is to hate?
To wield the metal of a blade,
And to damn yourself either way,
Whether you take a life or give yours away?
Hands once bloodied, bloodied remain,
What hasn't been broken will have been maimed.

And while you sit beside this hearth,
Those men return into the dirt,
Having fought for you, my heart!
Having ruined themselves, their souls depart,
The Devil will embrace them all with mirth,
And God will frown upon the earth.

You, My death, you've made them sinners,
You've taken their homes and poisoned their dinners,
You've turned their blades on fellow men,
You've begun a game that has no end,
A game that never can yield winners,
But only men, and those men, killers.