Love.
So beautiful,
So dreamlike,
So fragile.
Enamoured by the thought of love,
He gave himself freely.
So innocently
His blood
Pooled,
Spilled,
Dark and red and beautiful
From the first rose.
And oh, how he loved roses.
How overjoyed,
Delighted,
He had been.
Every day, like clockwork
A bouquet would arrive.
Perfect, pristine redness
With an alluring scent
That made him sigh so softly
With the thought of love on his mind.
Nothing, nothing,
Absolutely nothing could have prepared him
For the thorns,
Their treachery hiding behind
Such lovely, lovely petals
Of vibrant red.
When the sweet kisses
Melted him
So slowly,
So subtly
Into a dark abyss,
He embraced it all
Without a second thought.
He didn't even notice
Until it grew
And grew
And thorns,
Horrible, gnarled thorns,
Captured his poor heart
And squeezed,
Choking him
Like barbed wire.
From his soft bed of roses,
He admired
The suaveness,
The beauty
Of his petals.
But trapped within a prison of roses,
He remained controlled,
Fearing the pain
Of his thorns.