The Devil Came Wearing Your Face
I longed for you in drifting dreams,
Where dusk lay heavy, starless, pale;
I called your name through velvet dark
And kissed your palm, already frail.
You did not come to soothe the ache
That flowered dark beneath my skin;
You left me housed with whispered sins,
Among the damned you ushered in.
You never knew what absence carved,
Nor saw the wounds your cruelty pressed;
Your mockery wore the guise of mercy,
And torture wore the face of tenderness.
You lost yourself in shadowed rooms,
To spirits poured like sacred draughts;
Your soul went wandering, unmoored,
While mine paid dearly for your drafts.
The clocks stood still when you returned,
Their hands like bones against the wall;
Your laughter rang like cracked church bells,
A hollow hymn that promised all.
I learned to kneel where hope had stood,
To pray in rooms that answered none;
Each vow you broke became a scar,
Each silence weighed a ton.
My youth lay buried in your moods,
A ghost you never cared to see;
I grew accustomed to the dark,
Mistaking grief for loyalty.
I was so young, untaught in grief,
Unwarned how love could be withheld;
It seemed the devil came at last,
And through your eyes his gospel swelled.
Now ivy climbs the ruined walls;
The house remembers what you did.
But I have learned to leave the dead,
To cross the threshold where they hid.
I speak your name without a prayer,
No curse, no longing left to bleed;
The child you left in candle smoke
Has grown beyond your reach, your need.
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