The first time I read this poem was in my teens, came across it again today as I was sorting through some of the books I left at my parents place. The poem was even the inspiration for a graphic arts project I did at college … <\/p>\n
\r\n Vampire Sestina \r\n\r\nI wait here at the boundaries of dream,\r\nall shadow-wrapped. The dark air tastes of night,\r\nso cold and crisp, and I wait for my love.\r\nThe moon has bleached the color from her stone.\r\nShe'll come, and then we'll stalk this pretty world\r\nalive to darkness and the tang of blood.\r\n\r\nIt is a lonely game, the quest for blood,\r\nbut still, a body's got the right to dream\r\nand I'd not give it up for all the world.\r\nThe moon has leeched the darkness from the night.\r\nI stand in shadows, staring at her stone:\r\nUndead, my lover . . . O, undead my love?\r\n\r\nI dreamt you while I slept today and love\r\nmeant more to me than life -- meant more than blood.\r\nThe sunlight sought me, deep beneath my stone,\r\nmore dead than any corpse but still a-dream\r\nuntil I woke as vapor into night\r\nand sunset forced me out into the world.\r\n\r\nFor many centuries I've walked the world\r\ndispensing something that resembled love --\r\na stolen kiss, then back into the night\r\ncontented by the life and by the blood.\r\nAnd come the morning I was just a dream,\r\ncold body chilling underneath a stone.\r\n\r\nI said I would not hurt you. Am I stone\r\nto leave you prey to time and to the world?\r\nI offered you a truth beyond your dreams\r\nwhile all you had to offer was your love.\r\nI told you not to worry and that blood\r\ntastes sweeter on the wing and late at night.\r\n\r\nSometimes my lovers rise to walk the night . . .\r\nSometimes they lie, cold corpse beneath a stone,\r\nand never know the joys of bed and blood,\r\nof walking through the shadows of the world;\r\ninstead they rot to maggots. O my love\r\nthey whispered you had risen, in my dream.\r\n\r\nI've waited by your stone for half the night\r\nbut you won't leave your dream to hunt for blood.\r\nGood night, my love. I offered you the world.\r\n\r\n by Neil Gaiman\r\n\r\n<\/pre>\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The first time I read this poem was in my teens, came across it again today as I was sorting through some of the books I left at my parents place. The poem was even the inspiration for a graphic … Continue reading