The echoes of mourners rattle like rain upon the stained glass corridors on my midnight dreams and I have no escape but for the embrace of the other world where the spiders have woven a bed for me to rest during the lonesome holocaust that  is the hours I dwell without my lover. In reflections I see only a withered husk of a woman and my shadow is ragged with vestiges of rags allowing the smallest beam of light to tear across my molecules and burn the earth beneath my feet. High on the tops of buildings where black coal has painted her tired lines of age there sits a vulture with the softest eyes like a holy cow ruminating on my thoughts turning them into a meal for worms.

Shadows in branches and padlocks on ankles hold the children of the dark tightly in their circle of flaming crosses. Songs pour like wax from the throats of old maids who stand with bent spines and teary eyes in shame at the delights they have foresaken in order to stand in their apparent light while we, the children of the darkness, applaud the coming dark bore of death and relish the flames burn to our flesh.

How delicate is the trembling flower that is trodden on by livestock hauling the beams that will be used to carve out a temple for our promises. Beam upon brick will tower towards the taunting clouds and without fear we can sleep for eternity inside our magical black cage that is only a shroud of ether.