I made my temple your ribcage,

Your ribcage my altar.

Buried myself in angry, wet organs

(Alive and pulsating, but oh, so silent),

Prayed for you, for salvation,

For a life outside of myself,

Tried to look for a way out

Through stained glass,

For something much bigger to blind me

With bright light and brilliant direction.

You ignored me,

Crushed my baby’s bones with every breath.

You were cold, cruel,

With the slight of usurous hand

I remember the brittle grasp,

Halo driving Frankenstein holes into my crown,

Twisted thorns, dried blood.

Martyrdom gave me cause,

Found in-and-amongst the arc that beckoned me,

Knelt and kept and quiet.

You licked the honey from my wounds

Brought warm milk to my lips.

Baptised in your sweat

I felt the spring of new life,

In the sly glint of your eye,

In breathlessness, and fatigue

In the emptiness that my flesh had come to love and protect,

Open-armed and eager.

For you I would draw that

Five prick-pointed star,

Light the roman candles,

Lie in familiar blood,

Feed my head with flame.

For you I would burn, drown,

Or otherwise disappear.

For you I would resurrect

Not a minute later.

But, in the end,

Every girl must look beyond Her idol.

Must find heaven, even in the parts of Herself

That hurt like hell.