Narrated by Sara Tantlinger
We are a theater performance,
and bravissima to the swan song
of our death. Tragedian masks
are given to lovers with scorched
lies. When the curtain descends
will you leave me in blisters?
Here is my indecisive mind, full
of smoke and ash, and there waits
my heart, but you call it a snake.
All it ever wanted was to escape
and bathe on sunlit rocks. Despite
my cold-blood, baby I ache for
the way your skin burns against
mine like ashes from the sun.
The finale of us does not deserve
applause, only silence. Our stage
performance is a brief diversion
from the invisible string stitched
between us. I wait to get severed
from your body dressed in hellfire.
You won’t be blamed. I often wish
to be free of me as well, to cut my
own string, but darling I like me more
than I like you, and your sun thread
looks frayed the more you cloak hurt
and throw it like a brick through ribs.
My heart may ache, but my mouth is sharp
and your life line is thin between my teeth.
BIO: Sara Tantlinger is currently pursuing her MFA through Seton Hill’s Writing Popular Fiction Program. Her poetry has appeared in several literary magazines, and she also has publications with the SFPA and HWA. Find her on Twitter at @SaraJane524