monkshood and rue

and i was born on the first day
of the dying season
long-limbed and tender-tongued,
a debt of bones
and satin skin and
borrowed heart beating beneath
the swinging sword
of time.
a shadow brushed my
wide eyes into sable,
kin to the cold ground
beneath the jeweled leaves
dancing on the breeze
like fading embers,
a brisk
autumn kiss
dipping deep into my lungs,
the whisper of ghosts
from a haunted star
shrugging softly across
the shivering night.
every one of them warned me
about you.
pay no heed to monkshood and
you'll line your pockets with rue.
i read my fate like a fortune-teller
in the glow of candlelit eyes,
burnt twigs snapping black
in the bonfire at my back,
a graveside serenade
that sang my descent
into madness
as i pressed closer
to your pale shadow
every doubt crumbling like old leaves
in your curling hands.
grasping, always asking
for more, your smile
falling like a scythe
sharp, brittle-breaking
at the edges,
my own fears
took shape in the voids
you left
like monsters in the dark,
chasms carved
with your hungry claws
until i grew weary
of this hollow game--
all night-dance and shadow-play
and puppets pulled
to your ambivalent embrace
until i, hazy,
hesitant, hanging by a thread,
cut our last tie and
turned you from my table.
and i perched
on the old porch railing
as the fiery autumn light
faded,
slipped into starlight
strung overhead like a spiderweb
the night air cool and sweet,
and i thought
the falling, this
letting go, the last breath breaking
on the horizon of my heart
is familiar to me,
silence and shadows
more solace
than they ought to be.
but, then, every ending
is lashed fast to the beginning, and
my first sight was the forest
shedding its colored cloak
with somber grace,
wheels of the world turning
slowly into decline,
for i was born on the first day
of the dying season.