The Burning Accusation

Your eyes are witchy. I do not mean

feminine, although I have heard envy

in the moans of girls not blessed with lashes

so long and so thick--

lashes that cast butterfly shadows over your cheeks.

No. I mean that your eyes

are veiled--sometimes--and deep,

when you will it--or sometimes prismatic

with glee and malice--or bold, or teasing,

or benign in thought--sometimes avid in the hunt--

or furious in thwarted pride--or, sometimes,

rarest of all (I have seen it--I would swear

that it was real) gentle.

Your eyes are dangerous--they captivate--

they refuse to make promises--

so I call them witchy.

In another century, in another life,

they would have hanged you...

I am certain of it.

You stand on a scaffold inside my head--

and your mocking gaze does not waver, even

when the noose tightens around

that pretty neck of yours.

The smug nonchalance of your beauty

flares brightest in the jaws of doom.

I know you would have hung

for the witchery of your eyes--

because, inside my head,

I am the one who releases the trap door.