You think the night

is beautiful,

with her endless

cascade of stars and

the way she wears the clouds

so seductively--

billowing wisps of froth

that adhere to her frame

like a silk negligee,

their mere existence

dependent solely upon

the curves of her body.



She's the girl next door;

the one who keeps you up at night,

the woman you want to undress.



You admire her

for her quiet,

for her stillness.



You worship her,

for she is the keeper

of both dreams and wishes



But I am afraid

you have mistaken her mournings

for loveliness.



What you thought were stars

are really tears,

molten pearls of silver

whose painful scorches

have blemished the

velveteen shadows

of the night.



And the clouds are not truly clouds

but ringlets of cigarette smoke

that arise from her

chapped, wine-stained lips,

imposing onto the air a heavy smog that

sputters throughout the blackness.



Sometimes,

she will sing,

her symphonies chaperoned by

the melancholy of Ursa Minor.



"I heard that you like 

the bad girls, honey. 

Is that true?"



The vibrato of her voice

ricochets off the

planes of the universe.

"A fine performance!"

they cheer.

(for someone who is

so unfathomably sad).



The Gods

say she is a warped record,

a label that is dictated,

not by her pitch,

but by her broken heart.



And you will listen

to her anyway;

for she will put you

to sleep with her lullabies

whose sorrow you have

failed to acknowledge--

a sorrow you have mistaken

for beauty.



But, then, perhaps you had known

of her sorrow all along.



Perhaps that was what

had captivated

you in the first place.



After all,

dark minds think alike.