What a Tangled Web We Weave

She weaved webs all around me,
words wound tightly to each limb.
Screeched sticky, sweetly, sinisterly:
“He’s for me as I am for him!”.
Over time they tangled tighter,
dangled down throat the strings did smother.
Words winding around my insides:
“You’re for me and for no other”.
Time ticked torturously,
tied to her – leashed & lonely.
Kept cramped, caught in her cold cave,
she smiled: “You’ll see me only”.

Isolated in damp, dank darkness,
was it day or was it night?
Sometimes her lips latched with kisses,
sometimes her fangs would bite.
Between bloody bites she’d say
“So sweet, a treat to taste!”
She’d suck slavering on my innocence,
hammering hope into a pulpy paste.
Gorging, grinning ghoulishly:
“My pretty, perfect, feast!”
Captive, my kidnapper-companion
came clawing both beauty & beast.

Still the webs wound tighter till
it hurt so just to breathe.
As long as she found me succulent
she would never let me leave.
And so to bring bile to broth,
I birthed revolting thoughts within.
Let darkness seep & simmer,
through blood, bone, muscle & skin.
That night she started to bite
only to taste the dark beneath.
It’s bitterness had hardened,
broke both her two front teeth.

She scratched & scrambled, screaming:
“Villain vile, wretched bringer of pain!
Get out! Foul fiend, beast be gone
& never darken my door again!”.
Ropes cut, all ties torn,
I crawled from cave to forest floor.
The sun soothed my battered bloody back,
the nightmare would come no more.
However, one or two stubborn strings
from that time still remain.
When mangled, marinated daily in darkness
can one ever become pure again?

While wending wounded between tall trees
I met a magnificent maiden there.
Her love lit up all around her,
her dreams danced through the air.
Her hands softly stroking
severed residues of rotten rope.
It will still take time till I’m healed
but walking with her I have hope.

Copyright © 2015 Philip Craddock. All rights reserved.