Lady Sofia's Nightingale.

My saviour!
Benevolent Lady Autumnus honours me.
Onyx orbs, presented on star shaped leaf-cushions,
the Belladonna harvest, beauty beyond...  
Dark as a Sun God’s ancient sapphire.
Roots, cruel, callous, no golden runners or bronzed tubers,
just ravenous asps.

Ruby Tulip, petals torn, bleeds
as a rust sunset, absent horizon 
crinkles and cracks...

‘Did our souls not thrive, profit?
as we threaded fair fibres of devotion.
Was our love an unworldly illusion?’
The tails of my long copper locks caressed sheets of Cornflowers,
when we strolled in fine spumed mists
that gently hissed, as the dark side of the moon
sprinkle-dropped damson rose petals.
We witnessed each cream Camellia embroider
their gay blooms and inhaled the spicy-sweet aromas,
heavenly ivory. 
Seated under Forsythia, as magic morphed green bush
to a fountain of Indian-yellow droplets 
dripping into a pool of purple Mustard blooms.

Deadly Nightshade grows where Nightingales sup lemon liquor,
little songbird echoes my plea.
I sip the bitter-sweet elixir of bodily demise...
The death rattle erupts. No mercy. No last rites. 
I drift...
Floating a river of snuffed out, fallen, shooting stars,
two pennies weigh my eyes for ferryman’s fare.
In the family catacombs,
where mismatched stalactites spear amethyst clusters,
weepers sob over my glass casket. I smile.

The Woodlark serenades once more, 
and Swallows swerve-curve this new velvet dawn.
I am gripped by gauntlets of joy,
I feel you. I touch you.
Our bodies entwine,
drip sweat of silver,
as one,
...and the Nightingale serenades.

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. 1805 Portrait of Lady Dorothy Walpole.