She’s a storyteller,
a woman in white,
cage of black, spilling
my mad love into the ear
of the giver of stars.
A god, damning
me for the moments
at midnight, judging
my weakness by narrow
verse, she hangs me on
opinion’s tongue forgetting
I only grow stronger in affliction.
Starlight tests the mushroom of gossip,
sifts through foul soil of its roots,
and finds the gaslight it feeds on.
A storyteller, who would be god,
discovers the shadow words
she hoped to crucify me with
are now the cage she must survive.
©Susie Clevenger 2023
I was looking at my bookshelf, and found these five books stacked exactly as you see them. They are th inspiration for this poem.
