Beauty Plus Cosmetics

An almost funerary air
like bells in the distance
Still tolling
for the loved
and lost

They murmur gloomily
moving slowly
above the soft grass
Mourning
a honey-textured hymn
for someone they never knew to love
***
Suspicion
Like a coiled carpet-snake
It seems harmless enough
to begin,
lurking quietly
in the darkened reaches
of the mind

Then,
rasping gently
it slides
slipping smoothly,
Insidiously
over the truth
but rubs
just enough to catch the skin
ripping tiny holes
for hate to get in.
***
Rapunzel’s Leavings
Hairpin
A delicate butterfly
Toothed with silvery barbs
Lying abandoned

Once treed
Those tangled flaxen skeins
drawn to severe order
Now drowning in the dust.

Wicked
Curving thorns meant to trap
Keep and hold the unruly
Tresses blessed by Mab.

Spindles
Of brilliant dragonfire
Predatory but still soulless
Left to a lonely fate.