One Poem by Lisa Lahey

 

Still Life

 

The angel cried and shook her head

and swept the infant far away.

The mother held out her arms and begged and wept,

let me hold her just once against my breast.

But the angel said,

there is no time, there is no time

she’s far too beautiful for earth,

it lacks the innocence and the joy

that will protect her from any hurt.

She swept away the precious girl

from her grieving mother who had laboured

all her life to give this baby birth.

The castles and the carriages and the sunlit sky

of the mother’s childhood,

melted beneath the dragon’s fire 

that killed an innocent cry.

To comfort her, the angel sent

the mother dreams that night,

of unicorns and promises that love still lay ahead,

but along the way darkening clouds and grey slate stones

blocked her path; she must battle through her daughter’s death.

She’d have to climb this mountain of despair

and bear up under the crushing weight

of stolen hope and crumbling joy

until her body brought forth life again.

Yet still the angel’s voice rang woefully through her head—

there is no time, there is no time

she’s far more beautiful in death.

 

Lisa Lahey’s short stories and poems have been published in 34th Parallel Magazine, Spaceports and Spidersilk, Altered Reality Magazine, Why Vandalism? Suddenly, and Without Warning, Five on the Fifth, Ariel Chart Magazine, Vita Poetica, and Literally Stories. Her work has also been accepted by Same Faces Collection, Piker Press, Epater, Bindweed, The Pink Hydra, and Creepy Podcast.