Sestina: The Tender Void

"I burnt all of your pictures," I say.
"I let them go gray, let them decay."
You stare at me, stand, and sigh.
Disappointment lurches in your eyes.
There are fires burning out in the dark,
but we're staying in our cell tonight.

"There's value in it all - value in their eyes,
value in the way I captured them in the dark."
You cross your arms and go on to say,
"You shouldn't let anything decay."
A chill runs right through me; tonight
I would start even at the softest sigh.

"And you shouldn't have kept them in the dark."
I tell you this, but there's no point. You say
something to the effect of "Well, tonight,
that doesn't matter. The way I heard them sigh,
it was beautiful. You know how I liked their eyes:
the way I felt them all shuddering with decay."

I shake my head, though I can see the decay
of everything and the shadows that pass tonight.
Those feathery phantoms fly through the dark;
they step on my hands, they change the way I say
"You should never have forced their lives to sigh.
You should never have closed so many eyes."

Again, you stare at me, shudder, and sigh.
"Love, you know they didn't die. Their eyes -"
But I silence you. I want no more tales of decay.
I want you to admit you're wrong, now, tonight.
Eventually, you'll run out of horrors to say.
Your shriveled heart will unravel in the dark.

I am afraid of what's built up in here tonight.
You shove yourself toward the mirror and sigh.
I stand behind you, run my fingers over your eyes,
and whisper something true in the deceptive dark.
"Your work won't ever die out; it'll never decay.
It will always ring true in the things you say."

Of all these things I say, strongest is the debt of decay.
Silent, life will sigh: "Things pass away, things close eyes."
Even in the unmerciful dark, you can find forgiveness tonight.