Sick with Shadows:The Mirror's Tale

When you look at him

your eyes become moats

swirling around you

In a stream barely

as wide as the boats

promising rescue.

I couldn't hear

his sirens approach

When could you?

He was a crook

with a name like Death

and he hooked you.

Your eyes cracked

with tears at my side

I was your mirror

your world was my pride.

I made you think that

it might be inside me

Hoping to keep you

close and beside me.

You are the Lady of Shallott

Living dreams that would not sleep

Trapped in a castle

where yours was the keep.

You couldn't look

out a window or see

passed dim visions

reflecting from me

Watching from angles

you prayed to be free

Your curse wouldn't see

your true beauty through me.

My eyes cracked

with tears at your sigh.

I was your mirror

your shield and your lie

Hoping you would see

a future within me

but knowing someday

you would look beyond me.

When I reflected

upon his approach.

I begged you

to see me.

But you listened only

to his bugles blow

and their shrill

cracking.

I shuttered like the curious pictures

that change when someone looks.

Burning with a furious passion

unwritten in your books.

You were the Lady of Shallot

living visions I sought too.

It's not like mirrors reflect their own thoughts

I'm dreaming about you.

You said it was just

your reflection that bored you

So you never noticed

how much I adored you.

I was shattered

with tears at your side.

I was just a mirror

your guilt and your pride.

Your dance crazed the loom

that was our nest

it's web would surround you

Tangling your soft hair

in his crest

as it's colors

astound you.

I'm swept up

in a furious river

that washed

the tears away

an empty frame

stretched curious pictures

of the day

you sailed away.

When I dream a death

your lips

cease

to steam me

The crash

of a shard

of your kiss

falling cleanly.

Death freed you from

the castle where I kept

reliving my dreams

when or if I have slept

I can't even look

out a window and see true

For the sea as a gravestone

rolls constantly over you.

c c/g f capo 3