i wasn’t forced to fall in love, but i was lead into this place by the hand, holding onto something i can’t remember. cupid’s hand, however small it was, or maybe venus herself saying i’m worth more than my past as she rubbed the ashes away from my hands, from under my nails, away from my eyes. still, i was hesitant. i rejected it at first, my whole body fighting against the foreign object as it clouded my brain— it stung. i didn’t want to experience the same pain like a husband passed—gone so soon, so violently, an end i didn’t forsee because he blinded me with fool’s gold and promised me a life as a happy wife. but i’m no longer his, i’ve thrown his ring into the sea as i escaped. back then, i felt ashamed for leaving his grave at some distant shore, unmarked in the water behind my eyes because i didn’t want to remember what he’s done; i don’t want to feel what invisible wounds he’s inflicted like salt slicing into the cuts on my wrists.

but i remember now; not him, but you.

some arrow struck my head and knocked on my temple, and there you were on the marble stone steps. you weren’t looking for a place to rest— not even looking for anything in particular— and i let you stay for a bit so you can figure it out.

from then on, since you’ve graced (at times disgraced) my steps, you’ve made an impression on my mind so deep i couldn’t remember anything else but the weight in my mind that you carry. i could forget all of my responsibilities, my role in building the city outside of my temples, but i could never forget you, the mud you tracked in, stains fading as you gazed at my altars and cherished my sacrifices— guts open and bleeding, waiting for me to read the future in its black tar spilled— you looked at those and didn’t turn away, disgusted by my own frenzy as i tried to read for you in every thing i’ve laid hands on, everything i’ve laid eyes on. you reached out to touch the slit necks as if i made them for you to heal. after watching you smile at the carnage i’ve created, i stopped looking for the future in those tiny scraps and cadavers and instead looked at you, for you were my future.

i’ve done all i could to keep you, your ball and chain here beside me. i gave you clothes i wove for you to wear, with some of my hair woven into the fabric, a reminder that even if you’ve shed me like a coat, your skin is still mine. i’ve given you a bed i’ve warmed with my naked body, the sheets slick with my sweat— still, you stayed long after i’ve fallen asleep to whisper sweet nothings to me that colored my dreams, dreams i don’t remember. when i wake up, you turn away to face the sun on the horizon, away from the two orbs burning a thousand degrees because i want you to look at me.

looking at you now, i hope there isn’t anything waiting for you on the horizon, a calling from a distant shore for you to establish your own destiny, a calling from gods that appear as apparitions to you, gods you fear because they aren’t physical and yet here they are before you so you imagine monsters in their place to make sense of what you’re seeing, and they’re monsters you obey because you’ve been in bed with a monster and can’t bring yourself to bear scars of another one, and so you ready your fleet to leave me, Dido, without telling me of your fleeting plan to create a whole family without me, when you wanted a family within me.

and although you hear my pleas for you not to leave, i look this way and that, eyes flickering like an ember sparking in the fire, about to jump out because the heat is too much, flickering around the background behind you because i could never look at your eyes, your eyes are not cold but regretful that we’ve ever made it this far, and once your flicker of dull cold meets my flicker of hot, it all sparks in me a rage as i say you were never there groaning beside me as i experienced my pain, you were never there to console me as i lamented at the walls of my empty palace, your bed was never empty because of me, i your vessel, was there to fill up on your sorrows from a different land i’ve seen in passing but never moored on— and if you could look at me, i’d want you to fall apart first so you won’t see me fall apart after you turn your back.

but you still left, not wanting to cause me more sorrow by shedding a tear, because you never did regret me, but you did regret making the journey away from your home and meeting me on the way, the wrong time at the right place.

and so you leave at dawn, spurred on by the shades in your head you call your gods, gods’ voices whose whims you obey like the crack of a sail opening up for you to be filled with their empty air.

i take your belongings you left in a hurry and pile them in a pyre in the courtyard; the bed, your clothes, your armor and weapon. i tell no one of my plans and instead follow what the shaman says— i wanted to curse you with black smoke, like the same ash that clouded my eyes before.

i carry salt in my left hand and cast it around the fire; walk with one foot in a sandal and one bare on the ground; wear my dress off one shoulder so my skin can be kissed one last time by the light and shadow of the towering pyre. and once the rites have been righted, i curse your fleet to never find peace once you’ve found land, as any life without me is a life without the blue sky, and so i curse for it to fall on your ships as i plunge your sword into my heart, trying in vain once, twice, thrice to wake up from my stupor— i’m stuck behind my eyes. i’ve become a shade, tethered to the plane of the living so that i may haunt your lineage in your golden city built for your son and his sons, so that they’re reminded of war, always war. i was never able to sleep once you left, and so i’ll make sure you never sleep again.

a goddess, one i don’t believe in, runs her hands through my hair and coos indecipherable words to me— her voice sounds like yours. then she cuts a lock of my hair with her scissors and i’m set free to the underworld.

i blink again and you’re there on the bed. what an awful dream to have by your side— one dream filled with writhing furies of vengeance like black snakes sinking their teeth into the tarnished flesh of a corpse and spilling its black blood, one dream of a son running from the mother he never had because she dare crossed his father and caused a life of misery and never-ending nightmarish enemies, black thoughts galloping full speed across his mind, leading him to a frenzy like mine.

my mind does terrible things to me in the dark. i just hope you can still find it in yourself to look at me when morning light comes.