to the stars who listen: poetry

15. love letters

/ author's note: happy national poetry day! /

love letters

the duchess brushes her long hair before the gilded mirror
and she smiles at the parchment, rolls it carefully,
and tucks it into an ornate gold box
encrusted with rubies roughly the size and colour of her quickly beating heart
the words her love inscribed by candlelight,
wax-flecked and love-laced,
seep like a delightful poison into her bloodstream,
and she sleeps with inky fingers
and Marianne pretends to scold her in the morning,
but her floury apron pockets
are filled with precious little secret raisins and chocolate chips
the kitchen boy slipped her
when Boss wasn't looking.
'did you like the prince?' she asks as she helps her dress, dwelling surreptitiously on her secret love-baked gifts,
'he was a little arrogant for me,' laughs the duchess, her mind's eye on the crimson sentences
hidden in her jewellery box.
after the handmaiden gets off she meets the kitchen boy
whose kisses taste of cooking chocolate
and the princess, betrothed to a prince from a faraway land,
writes her love by moonlight
and addresses it to the boy who drives the carts, while
the duchess brushes her hair before the gilded mirror
and reads once again with a tear-stained face
the fading words of her fading love -
her last handmaiden,
who was left to die on the streets
for loving her
because she wasn't a man,
and all she had left was the meagre chocolate chips
from the sleazy boss in the kitchen
and eventually she became so cold, she made snowflakes fall.
yet love, a cycle, goes on,
winters pass, and the duchess falls in love
with the boy who grows the spring strawberries
and he makes her strawberry tarts
red and sweet as a love letter,
and the people fall in love
even with those they're not supposed to,
but nevertheless, it's beautiful how
love heals their broken souls
like a love letter.