Image – author’s own

bitter you are, with your lemon sharp teeth,
spouting cruel words from far beneath 
the rasp of your tongue and the knife of your smile,
you may possess beauty, but your character is vile,
your acidic ways are a corrosive salt crown,
your thorns drawing blood from the hearts that you’ve found
and cast aside, they’re so obsolete 
watching you fall from your high horse is delectably sweet 

attack you I must for your arrogant ways,
your character is rotting, there is a malaise
in the depths of your soul (if you have one left),
you may be quite empty, utterly bereft
of love, life and laughter, of joy and delight,
I see there is nothing, something’s not right, 
the source of your venom is just a pretence
it’s a shield, not a sword – it’s all a defence 

*****

Through taking part in the dVerse Open Link Night, I discovered a new-to-me poetry prompt – W3. Organised by David over at The Skeptic’s Kaddish, each week a different poet is Poet of the Week, who’s poem each participant reads before submitting their poem in response to the prompt. The poems are then read by the Poet of the Week who selects the next week’s Poet of the Week.

W3 Prompt #85: Wea’ve Written Weekly’s poet of the week, ladysighs, has prompted us to compose two verses according to the following specifications:

• “Opposites”:The first and last word of each stanza must be opposites of one another;
  • The two stanzas must use different opposites.
• No restrictions on form, length, meter, or rhyme;
• Thematic: Write about emotions, attitudes, and/or moods;

This was fun! I hope you enjoy reading this poem – do hop on over to the link above on The Skeptic’s Kaddish blog to read more of the wonderful poems. You could even take part yourself!