NaPo 11: 7 April - Snowdrop 4.3: The Glamour in the Depths

(I know this must be boring the shit out of folks, but 'Snowdrop' has been hanging around my neck, albatross-wide, for a decade now and I want rid of it. And the only way to be rid of it is to finish the bastard thing.)

Snowdrop 4.3: The Glamour in the Depths

Look at the mist: it curls around
a steepled church, its fingers pick
at mortars, at stones - its aim to break down,
dismember, detach and disolve each brick.
Look at the mist as it slowly slicks
the chapel in beadings and moistures unwound
from its essence, its echo heart: it drowns
the lands around in brine so quick
that even to stare is to perish. See
the magical mist, so thick.

Look at the soldiers, tattered and torn,
hidden in a space that will soon disappear.
They scratch at the earth to harvest corn
and some beans in their pods, seeds of the seer.
Look at the soldiers: so thin and folorn,
lost between time, their loss so severe
it drives them past fear to madness - hear
them pray to a god all dressed in thorns
and soot and the peels of paint. See
the soldiers, their tatters unshorn.

Look at the woman: she kneels on a bench.
Her mustard hair sweeps down in locks,
her golden eyes stare up to entrench
the stars in her mind, unwinding clock.
Look at the woman catch at her frock -
her fingers whiten: her head is wrenched
back to expose her neck. Then shock
as blood cascades from veins to drench
her spotless cotton dress. See
the woman collapse from the block.