🎵 A Necklace Sewn in Flesh (Patreon)

Tell me what this song means to you._[Verse 1]She walked out of the desert in my likenessHer braid unraveled, trailing sand like incenseHer rank embroidered where her throat should beA necklace of authority sewn into fleshI kissed her shadow against the trembling canvasAnd tasted copper, dust, and the echo of her breath[Verse 2]She departed for a span of weeksBut weeks became panes of brittle glassStretched and bent until they snappedAnd when she returned[Chorus]Her eyes were twin medallionsBright and blindPinned upon the breast of a stranger’s uniform[Verse 3]I reached for her hand—It slipped from me, slid onto his sleeve instead.He smiled the sanctioned smile of daylightA smile sealed in law and paperI mouthed her name,But the syllables fell soundless at my lips[Bridge]In my sleep I buried us in the motor poolBeneath oil that shimmered like stained glass waterInitials engraved on a rusted ration tinThat glowed phosphorescent green at nightLike relics of forbidden saintsBy morning the reliquary overflowedAnd all our names drowned in it[Chorus]When I wokeShe was not a girlBut a crow enthroned upon the iron bedframeHer wings pressed down with strips of tapeHer beak bent toward meStill whispering my name with liturgical persistence[Verse]I opened the window and she fell like a stoneOnly to rise again, transfiguredHer feathers dissolving into smokeHer form scattering like incense through a ruined nave.And each time she circled overheadThe memory of her face slipped furtherUntil it was lost to me[Outro]I stood in the doorway as the motor pool dimmedThe phosphorescent quiet, the oil in the windHer smoke wrote circles in the rafters of my chestEach pass thinning, paling, a relic without restI called her by the name we hid beneath the din—The air gave nothing back, the glass was paper-thinThe window kept the last of her—wings wet from the rain—And what remained of me, remained without her name._A Necklace Sewn in Flesh, Draft 2, M_01.wav