Poetry through the Seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer
something intimate
in the fading light.
cigarette butt
under boot heel.
white haired man.
sad girl.
shoulders kiss
on back porch steps.
a grin
only for him.
these are lonely days.
something intimate
in the night.
white haired man.
sad girl.
quiet comfort
in the fading light.
In white she appears, taking his breath,
though in truth he’d lost it a century before.
Her, he’d lost
seven plus
forty plus
one hundred days ago.
A hero’s death, though it matters not.
She stands small, weary from her journey,
her hands torn and bloodied. No one guesses
how they got so damaged, but he knows,
having fought the same battle back from the grave.
He is tender, soothing her wounds with
Mercurochrome and gauze, the only one
she can feel tortured with. He knows torture,
having dished out and taken his share.
Her sadness spills from his eyes and he
slams his hand. In his dreams, he’d saved her.
But despite strength, despite promises, despite
love, she died.
I’m fine, she lies, struggling to make it
from one moment to the next. Her secret,
she shares only with him. She can’t let
her friends know what she’s lost.
She was in paradise, not purgatory,
ripped back into a world of darkness
by those who claim their love.
Now they expect her to be happy.
But what is happiness to a soul
that’s been at peace? Can a story,
once complete, begin again?
Lying underground,
blond hair on white pillow,
fingernails and hair
still growing after death,
I awaken in my coffin,
gasping for air,
clawing through silk,
through wood,
through dirt,
summoned back
by your heartbreak.
But you, so selfish
in your sadness,
forgot where I lay
when you called me back,
and assumed my time away
was filled with sorrow.
The urn is smooth and silky
in my hands. The way
beneath my feet, craggy.
A stumble
launches her remains
into the wind,
joining with the mist
to hide my sorrow.
You share her face. I can’t
bear to look upon it.
Tiny creatures gather
for an impromptu memoriam
as I harvest pieces of her
from the garden.
Scant nourishment
for the starving.
At the top of a tower,
way up high,
a princess is tethered,
prepared to die.
Our hero, her sister,
fights demons below;
the Slayer they call her,
the ones in the know.
The enemy, a hell god
shut out of her world,
finds a key to re-enter –
a human, the girl.
The princess was ancient,
pure energy, the Key,
made human and grafted
to Slayer family tree.
Slayer swore to protect her,
little sister or not,
so she and the hell god
they battled and fought.
The hell god appears
as a beautiful girl,
strong and self-centered,
all darkness and curls.
This beast shares the body
of an innocent man;
it’s mostly his life,
she comes out when she can.
His weak human mind
drives the beast quite insane
so she sucks brains of others,
her composure regained.
These poor brain-sucked souls
see the Key in true form
and they lead the beast to her,
her sacrifice sworn.
Blood of the princess
will split open the sky,
unleashing demons and dragons,
then close when she dies.
The beast can slip back
through the crack to her realm,
leaving death and destruction
for everyone else.
A hell god disciple,
a small elf of a man,
pretends first to protect the girl,
then slices her skin.
A knight charges to save her,
takes a knife in the side;
the elf throws him over,
though he’d already died.
For he was made vampire
when Victoria was queen;
he killed lots of people,
but is now pretty clean.
With a government inserted
device in his head,
he no longer harms humans,
fighting demons instead.
Helps the Slayer, can you imagine,
he’s killed two before,
but this one, she’s different;
her, he adores.
His love swings a hammer
at the beast’s curly head;
the beating leaves her human
but not really dead.
Our Slayer is a hero,
she’s not like you and me;
when the beast becomes a man again,
she has to let her be.
So a dark wizard takes the reins,
a Slayer mentor true,
and steals the hell god’s final breath;
he’s seen a rodeo or two.
The Slayer scales the tower,
kills the elf with one quick blow,
sees her sister bleeding,
the portal opening below.
The princess accepts that only she,
as Key, can save the world;
her death alone can stop
what the hell beast has unfurled.
With dragons soaring overhead,
the Slayer remembers a truth:
that her blood and princess blood
are the same, she needs no proof.
So she kisses her little sister,
and throws herself into the swirl;
her death closes the portal,
returning balance to the world.
* * *
The knight and all who loved her
wept a hurricane that day,
for the Slayer, sister, hero
had forever gone away.
They laid her body in the ground
to rest in a hometown plot;
the inscription on her headstone read:
She Saved The World
A Lot.
I want to go home,
be a little girl
again,
away from all this struggle,
see my mother,
see my father.
A little girl again,
mud pies
my only responsibility.
I want to go home.
Be their baby
again,
held tightly
in arms
that love me,
be protected
from the pain of the world,
the smallest smudge
of guilt wiped clean.
I like it here
in the mind
of a child
where every day
I play.
Every day,
they love me.
As a child,
my life is sweet
like honeysuckle.
As an adult,
I wear this world
like a costume,
heavy and
tailored.
I want to go home
again,
be a little girl.
It finally hit me –
all I could take.
And I fell
to the floor
and was silent.
Responsibility
lies like a child
in my belly.
Ripening fast.
Full of sorrow
and possibilities.
Am I good?
Gathering my potions
to save or destroy.
Feeding
what can’t be fed.
Alone.
Heart in my hands.
Clutching,
clawing,
crawling.
Down.
On my knees.
Blind and ashamed.
Shattered mirror
of my mind.
Not enough to take me.
Did I tell her I loved her?
I was so young and the word love
so ancient.
Across the fire, I see her face
in the desert that appears after death.
With feline grace, she guides me
across the sands, to a place
where love is tortured and I am exposed.
Rub salt in the wound.
Forgive the salt.
Love the salt.
Beauty cannot drag from me the truth.
The truth is love and love is pain.
Hold onto love.
Protect it from all enemies.
I won’t forget
what you did
for love.
Tiny feet
walk on graves,
bring her back to me.
bone
breath
flesh
smile
If magic could return
her to this world,
would I cast that spell?
Or can I believe
she has lived
her life and moved on
to other obligations,
leaving me
to find a way
to walk the earth
without her?
It’s okay to cry
and cry
and cry
because without her
all I am
is tears.