Lady Capulet

    If there has ever been anything in my live I have loved, it was you. Not your hands, graceful doves that distract. Not your eyes, flashing wet black jewels, fringed in silk. Not your laugh, liquid brook, silver bird in flight. Not your walk, a cloud on the hills. Not the blushes that leapt too quickly to your cheeks, or the lips that spoke such innocent lies. You.
    You were always afraid of the dark. I would rush to your screams, and, opening the curtains to the moonlight, I would slip into your bed, and hold you, vigilantly, until the dawn. You would tremble in my arms, a fragile bird, for a while, then relax as limp as a cat, so suddenly that it never once failed to make me catch my breath, until I could make sure of yours. You heard music, all around you, in rain and wind, in water and in laughter. You leaped into dance, soaring little gazelle, rare and golden horned unicorn.
    You saw good in everything, a broken mandolin, a worn out shoe, and you planted them with flowers. Your father laughed, but was delighted, by your simple faith in goodness .
    A servant dropped your new mirror, and you held her hand as she cried, then helped her to a stool, and swept up the shards. I know, because I watched from the shadows.
    Awed and humbled by you.
    When my father died, and the light of the sun seemed dim to me, I cried, and you put my head on your shoulder. You patted me, as I had patted you through a thousand nights of colic, and you said, "It's all right, Mother. It's all right all right all right..." And I believed you.
You were a simple truth, and a profound one. Life and all creation existed, to me, because you were in it.
    I would that you had been born deformed, or of unfortunate face. Did he love you for your hands, then? The lucky shape, the slender grace? Did he love you for your hair? The shallow depths of your skin? Did he love the new budded curve of your breasts, bloomed just yesterday, not much different from a thousand other maids? Yesterday was Rosamond, for him, and tomorrow would have been Sophia. All lovely flowers. Each a beloved, but not each alone.
    I loved you down where the real Juliet lived. How could you have left me, for him?
    Who will tell me now, "It's all right, Mother. It's all right all right all right."

  (c) AmberSky, 2000
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Russian Gothic Project