Daughter of
Rimbaud
by Lucrezia

I was an enticingly spectral illumination in the dark when my young father saw me and called me "Queen-to-be!"

Now, at the end of a ravaging summer I dance about my unclaimed throne, dizzy and pleasured with murderous kisses from honey-razor boys upon my vestal throat. Belladonna, mystery, and strength lace my pent tears. The sky is opaque and white like my tiara of smooth serpent eggs undulating and ready to hatch, my bare body dewed with small shining jewels, my speech dewed with shining
words.

I would be a great sinner if only I understood such a thing as sin.

In a temple darkened by the vaporous quintessence of the stars, filled with incense in suckling tendrils rising, I lay prostrate on the altar of my ancestor, bleeding and garlanded with the bones of lesser maidens who he loved before me. I pour libations of quicksilver soliloquies which pool on the jaded floor below. I offer him cherries bursting ripe and purely red.

I know I will be crowned eventually, but O Father, when?

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