Stars dance across the walls
            where ruby red has turned to black.
The floorboards whisper their secrets to the heavens.

A beam of light falls across heavy lidded eyes,
pointing out the Prince of this palace.

He isn’t sleeping.

            He’s stuck in a lukewarm vision from last hour’s
                        fairytale full of dragons.
            A washed out fog behind his thin eyelids,
                        licked over with an emerald scale.

He isn’t dreaming.

            Beside him lies an ancient beast,
            reptilian in all its stitching.
                        When it parts its lips and
                                     breathes
                        it’s mingled with smoke and toothpaste.

He isn’t frightened.

            This little matchstick boy with
                        cobalt-stung eyes
            closes them against this mirage
                                     and whispers,

                                                  “Take me away.”

Cinnamon warmed cheeks
against an ivory pillow.

Your hand poised above hollowed hips
where light breaks to black,
folds itself into your mouth,
and eats away your sweetened breath.

She’s the ruby red mistress of the night.
Sleek black stockings that ride up
                                                  and up,
where they disappear beneath a wave of bloodied silk.
Her hands, glassy porcelain at her sides, are freezing to the touch,
and her hair, pulled back into a neat twist, is blacker than her eyes.

She’s the made-up maiden of drunken men’s dreams.
Eyes rimmed in smoky coal and lashes smudged against her cheeks.
Men imagine their thumbs running across her mouth,
smearing in her lipstick and running along the cool line of her jaw.
She’s painted her face just for them.

She’s the hometown harlot of this little city;
tainted and obsessed over by faithful men,
with faithful jobs and proper white picket fenced lives.

She’s only around after midnight, when the stars are muted,
and the moon glows orange against her cheekbones.