I didn't bite her to kill,
I wanted what made him love her so,
the moonlight showed me shapes and secrets,
and I translated them with my tongue,
oh, she fell like all things do in the winter,
body breaking apart like briars on the cobblestone,
and he cried out for her,
Thisbe!
Thisbe!
Thisbe!
Oh,
how he wept with her dripping like mulberry wine across his arms,
asking the moon to wash her skin,
for the darkness to not touch her,
for the world to be quiet like her heart.
Oh, such poetry that I wished that I didn’t taint her with my teeth, that I wasn’t a predator,
and it wasn’t my nature to eat away beautiful, healthy things.
I didn’t bite her to kill, I wanted what made him love her so,
the moonlight showed me shapes and secrets,
and I tasted it on the tongue,
drank from the fountain greedily,
staining my lips,
sealing what the Fates had sketched out in the stars;
a maid caught in teeth of a lioness instead of her lover’s arms,
not a poet, who wanted to recite lovely things.
*
Word Not World series is an interactive anthology where I show a picture, and use the words inspired by the picture to make a poem, such as this one. This poem was inspired by the words, “healthy” by Sudir (@sekharansudhir) and “predator,” by Angela (@angela_psalm). If you would like to participate in next week’s Word not World series, keep an eye out on Instagram @enis.st.sparrow and here on St. Sinjin, I will post a picture on Sunday.