“A Red Dress and a Blue Corset” by Nicole Heinz

She wore a red dress and a blue corset,

the laces tied ever so tightly

She owned the hardened streets of

the moon-lit night so that

her heels never clicked upon arrival

She fed from red wine as

her wraith like form danced

Her watchers waited in turn

with greedy eyes

for a single rose chance

Oh, that wisp of a girl

with black-painted nails

and ripened lips

How they marveled at

her beautiful loneliness

Alas, the hands of midnight passed

to her once sacred place

As the hour-glass emptied

its last chance

to bring light to the sky,

she laid the dress into a pile of

ever-growing red

Her heart clenched fitfully

into a cold slumber, a lone tendril

of curl against her blue corset