The Scarlet Ruse
- a portrait


She turns and locks the door.
This cliff house, this... mirage,
Their pinch me I'm dreaming life,
A pitched crash in her mind.
Shards of phrases,
Rapier pointed syllables,
Caustic vowels,
A consonant dissonance
Railing at the empty halls,
Shattering the logic of her peace.

Grit-snicking the sand she descends
Hearing only her steps
On this granite record of their passage.
The cavernous crash of the surf
Its endless wash of tears
Baptismal, cleansing,
Splashing on the ears of her wounded heart.
Raw, healing,
Stinging, sealing,
Disinfecting the cracks in their cloven lives.

She drives away,
The knives of a rising sun in her eyes.
She wonders in her blindness
If she'll ever love again.
Wryly smiling at this foolishness,
Slowly rolling down this sun bleached ribbon,
Away from his cowardice,
From the echoes of his petty fears
Into a deep bone sadness
Of these broken Caribbean dreams,
And the trap of his victim.
The deadly jaws of his scarlet ruse.