Melanie Hammet: Listen⎟

Devastating Beauty 2002

there is a beauty devastating like a serpent it lies waiting
a single strike-a poison or elixir
too lovely and too much to tak a shattering, a dam it breaks
and nothing else and no one else can fix you

but who can say

what is true?

i love you

your love is in me like a wedge it splinters my unconscious edge
and leaves me with no feeling only carvings
it paints my face as though for war i arm against those i adore
and i am wounded by my lover's markings

but who can say
what is true?
i love you

is it passion is it lust does my desire break my trust
would something sweet and simple seem more caring
but i hunger for your mouth and hands imagination--it demands
a blood connection violent and daring

but who can say
what is true?
i love you

but is there pause and is there peace the day-to-day, the sweet release
a beauty in a lover and a friend
perhaps a devastating kindness perhaps my passion is my blindness
all things being equal in the end

but who can say
what is true?
i love you