Ode to my heart

O heart, the poor prisoner of my state,
the child of accursed fate;
the debtor of unrequited love
and unvested woes:

Betrays the face that stops my tears,
illudes my closest kin;
betrays my mind that scarcely hears
the conspirators of sin.

Rivers of treason and guilt
have swelled your sea of grief.
If this is how the satan stings,
let him have my fief.

Yet joys of youth are long washed out;
This heart lies dry and bare.
If I could I would separate this
spent stage to reclaim tare.

The sedge is withered, the flame is iced:
rock bottom couldn’t be lower.
And all your sisyphean sacrifice
bled you to sterile sewers.

And now you weep at my expense,
beyond shadowed Tibet in June;
like daughters of the Indian sky
when sick of torrid noon.

But why half-beat in fuzzy pain:
a needle stuck in skin?
Take your call, either side,
Let me lose or win.