Death By Roses

death by roses, she thought, 
death by roses

but she couldn’t write about that right now –
her skin was too thin not to write about stars,  
because heartache was a burden that was too heavy to bear

so, she sat there, writing about stars, 
forgetting about how he once brought her red roses and watched her bloom

she wrote about stars and kittens and the rising of the sun on cold January mornings, 
so that warmth might settle into her bones,
if only for a moment 

she sat there, pen in hand, 
pretending everything was fine,
writing about stars she couldn’t see,
warmth she could no longer feel

her skin was too thin not to write about stars,  
because heartache was a burden that was too heavy to bear,
and when she stopped writing about stars and kittens and the rising of the sun on cold January mornings,
the bruises felt all too fresh and the scars still itchy and tender 

when she stopped writing about stars and kittens and the rising of the sun on cold January mornings,
her pen couldn’t stop writing about how he cracked open her rib cage with fistfuls of longing, 
about how he watched as her entire being bent toward the light of his promises of forever,
about how she gave him pieces of herself she’d never shown another human being,
only to be pricked by his indifferent thorns,
about how he haphazardly plucked her from the life-altering soil and left her to wither to dust 

she knew for certain that to love is to burden oneself with cracks in one’s rib cage,
with bruises and scars,
with the inevitable dangers of thorns

her skin was too thin not to write about stars –
but if he were to show up on her doorstep with open arms and a fistful of red roses…..

death by roses, she thought, 
death by roses

–image via Pixabay; written in response to Mindlovemisery’s First Line Friday prompt; another popular, older poem that’s been revised a bit (again)

Advertisement