Prodigal Daughters

shorebirds slicing the dawn into tatters.
you found me without a tether.

drifting in that endless blue, sans anchor, sans moor.

I was a drenched and drowning thing until you, like Jove
in the guise of an eagle, lifted me to higher realms.

if I were a moon in your eyes, if there was mercy in your lies,

I missed it. I was fain to take flight. the fight drained
from you like the lake in the last month of the drought,

when we gasped for air like fish longed for water,

submerged in a sorrow so sweet I could not help but drink.
there are only scars where all my stars used to be.

when the rains came, it was autumn and all our crops

had withered in their fields. the rain hid the tears
we shed when we went walking in search of something,

anything; and returned clutching the final embers of our faith

despite the way it burnt our fragile fingers and how
the going out of the light was worse than the pain

of the self-same passion when the first spark struggled

to take hold. write an ode to the flame
you mistook as eternal; say a small prayer

for the eternity you burnt down like Rome

as it was besieged by barbarians at the gates
of the mighty empire we never built.