you are buried deep underground
like winter’s favorite
slaughter,
spring’s daughter
Persephone
in her tomb of
bone and gold.
you are the sudden
eruption of fruit on vine,
and fences lined with
a crust of
flowers.
you wraith like honeysuckle
and rage in thorns.

you are both
the rising,
and the metamorphosis:
the  lasting arrival.
you are the dark queen
in her final hours
returned to Earth
to wage a
war.

you are Persephone’s
final futile hours
screaming at the flowers,
soaking everything in
massacre.

“the crusade”