Fang and Fire

Sometimes when I feel bold,
Bored of games and tricks,
I take you off—
Tear you off, really.
I shed you (like a venomed serpent
Trades his rotten skin for beauty).
But only once.

I hate you.
Your ugly tendrils cover me
With promises of freedom.
They mold me.
Draconian myth!
Your sullen whispers
reek of suffocating safety
(There is evil lurking here).

But fearing and doubting Heaven
(And his sword— his claws),
I hide in your embrace.
I absconded deep within
My trap for you.
Surely its better here
Than gasping in your pool,
Uncovered, flayed.

No subtle ploy
can lure me from this play.
Though boldness comes
and though I wake
I must (must) sleep
That you might dream.
So I breathe deep
And drown again.

Mendacity

Sometimes real things vanish.
Their shadows linger on as an echo of a scream.
A scream, a tear, a torn thing.
Once true; now lies.

Sometimes True things aren't.
They're masqueraded and pretended. Masked by friends,
Also pretenders, and all their children run and hide and
Vomit and die.

Sometimes I'm the falsehood.
And a slough of self deceiving flattery flows through my fingertips.
But not my True and Real and Self alone
lies floundering in my dereliction.
I release my mendacious
offspring and they
fly; I will not
be the only
one to
cry.