Kali

{1/3}

I step through the rubble.
I watch the smoke curl in rising wisps.
I take a deep breath as the storm's last bellow echoes in the distance.
I have built it all up and
I have torn it all down.
Now, I'm tired.
As I walk towards what awaits on the horizon, 
I feel it:
A touch, a stroke, a caress,
from the nape of my neck to the tiniest small of my back.
My eyes close and my smile wobbles as I watch you trace the route with your lips when we're sweat-soaked and done,
a reminder that I am not just desired;
I am adored.
Except your lips are nowhere to be found
and the touch I feel is simply imagination.
I let it slip from me and fall amongst the detritus at my feet. 
Now, onward.
To the light.

*****

{2/3}

From this vantage point I survey
the battleground
where we fought
to the death.
I spent my powers
with passion and fortitude and grace.
In that way,
I won.
It only occurs to me now
that I had it all wrong.
With every cell that constructs me
gleaming,
beckoning,
offering, 
with every part of me
freed,
undefended,
and split wide open,
we should have
always been on the
same
side.

*****

{3/3}

I tried to conjure some
pretty words
to whisper.
But the ones that came
when I called
were sharp-edged,
and dark.
They cut me first —
a message they insisted I hear —
and then nestled themselves between my fingers,
waiting.
You turned to me (only because my clothes were off),
unsuspecting.
So I lasciviously licked
my cruel-lipped smile
and threw with utter precision:
Wrists.
Ankles.
Carotid.
Serifs as scythes.
The flow was poetic confection,
all thick,
sweet,
and worthy of my best crystal goblet.
You seemed surprised as you lay there, felled by what you never saw coming.
But didn't you know?
Red has always been
my favourite
colour.