A MOON-STAINED POEM

The dome of sky has dissolved,
And in the snowstorm's hearse
Dead flowers are being carried
To the dust to meet their curse.

In this hour of melancholy,
On the blanket of darkness,
The moon has slept taking me
In her motherly embrace.

Yet I feel like an orphan,
And seek some solace with a shaking hand,
Oh, how everything has collapsed about me
Like a ruined castle of sand!

All my cries are stonewalled
By the silence so absolute,
Their wounded echoes return to me
To coagulate my tears and make me mute.

The tendrils of vine of darkness
Are surrounding me as if to claim
My tears and sighs and heartbeats
In lieu of a moon-stained poem.

-Portia Burton