She stutters on the threshold: a sun fixed on the horizon. Bodies susurrate as she wades through them. A daily routine – but what are days? The cavern underneath the world admits no light from sun or moon, Sight granted by the fragile luminosity of the pale, pale once-alive. She walks through the dead: has always walked through the dead will always walk through the dead Or – her mother was life, is life, above – She stutters on the threshold.
Clarity. She no more meanders, but strides. The sun creaks and groans, and rises. Breaths short and sharp, she runs: A tree, an illogical tree in an illogical garden, In this illogical cavern. (but this was before logic) Hunger pangs do not slow her, She is hungry for change, for resolution; For conclusion to dim the gnaw of uncertainty.
A globe gripped in a quivering hand. She peels back the membrane (like the skin of the earth as it opened to swallow her) Scoops a glistening fistful of rubies And gulps them down, Blood of the fruit painting her chin like a child at the close of October, Play-acting, false horror, for the sake of cloying sugars; Her eyes are not that of a child.
She kisses the mouth of He that stole her. They ascend, hand in terrible hand; He sits, gestures, to Her new place beside him. With a smile of crimson certainty, The Queen of the Underworld takes Her throne.