Contemplating My Mortality

I once imagined it would be you,
dancing between my thighs
during the days when I first
contemplated my mortality.

What else to think of a man
who brought me glass slippers,
and plaited my hair with sunlight
before spilling promises
as easily as cheap wine
in a brothel?

We have declined into silence, 
trapped here among the cinders.
I mark off these charred days
with blood on my calendar.

Will I escape you, I wonder;
flee to my pumpkin
before the clock strikes twelve?

Answers elude, but
when gravediggers
line up with shovels
and women perfume my feet
with sage, should one soul
bend and softly inquire
about life's greatest
disappointment, I'll say,

you, dear,
it was you.

Pris Campbell
©:2004

Art: Source Unknown

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