warm, newborn autumn. the sun sunken, sky rimmed with last blue. moon rising yellow and swollen.

piazza san marco full of life. a resplendent crowd. hitched skirts and tapping shoes. an impious minuet. strings ablur in accompaniment. thousand masks black, white and colored.

candles flickering mirrored in languid waters.

she, gleaming pearl of the night.

the gondola glides to her stop. an assembly of young men descends to offer hands, arms, whispers. her paramour's borrowed servitors attend. the lutist pauses, then hastens his tune.

she is hidden beneath the face of a lapis hound. women of lesser graces flock to her, those of piousness huddle and mock her. men with money, men with soul, line up to offer their discreet coins, their gaudy poems.

she laughs at all behind splayed fan.

the lutist hopes she looks his way.

a knife in the dark.

bejewelled handle. tearful eyes of a betrayed heart. you made me do this, you made me do this. he cuts through the crowd like his blade through the gamurra.

scream, but not hers. men grab his arms, his shoulders. he spits curses through broken teeth.

she sinks to the cobblestones, ladies gripping at her. they invoke the mother, weep for the whore. blood pools kermes red. her fan slips out her fingertips.

through the eyes of the hound, she watches last light fade from the heavens.

the mask never leaves her face.

a pink moon hangs low in the sky.

newly risen. odd. fuller than it should be. it's begun the steady ascent to the summit.

at sunset, its true color will show. nights of tar-black will follow. after each, a slower dawn, a darker day.

come sabbath of its existence, there'll be no light but for the mosquito-moon. face near enough to leave fogged breath on the glass of the vivarium.

but for now, it is pink.

and in the low mists where grasslands and the wellspring meet, gentle stalks sway with the breeze.

those which prostate the deepest, touch the crown of a beast.

a kiss.

a kiss.

the blue hound sleeps.