Pretty
Ophelia
by Christi Underdown
(King Claudius from Hamlet, Prince of Denmark by William Shakespeare)
"I
say, we will have no marriages; those that are married already, all but one,
shall live; the rest shall keep as they are."
-Hamlet from Hamlet, Prince of Denmark
by William Shakespeare
I
am Ophelia drowning
in an ocean of black
wings and a burning hope of unspoken promises.
You have been gone from my bed a month.
The sheets have not changed and
I bleed absent passions,
which give me another lifetime's freedom,
exempt from extra madness.
Yet I risk my heart and my life to come
every time
when you call and
lie underneath/
on top of/
beside you and suckle from your heart,
any kind of love you will give.
You
are tied in your misery,
longing for a California sun,
warm and honest and happy,
perfect.
So you protect yourself against the approaching cruel cold of the Denmark wind,
dressing in black fur or a midwestern myth,
a longing freedom and actively pushing away
from those dying
(in water and by sea captain's knives)
to hold you.
So
I open my door.
I give you back your letters,
written in soft longings and rough animalistic passions,
not by my father's request, but yours.
But you refuse to take them.
And we yell and argue and cry and
throw our indifference
(which hurts more than your hand),
breaking vases and mirrors and walls,
only to fall exhausted into each other's lovemaking.
What
to do, what to do...
or even think or feel,
when I have let you go as much as I can and
I am tore apart each time you say your several good-byes.
Now my sickness has stolen my voice and
I am silent in grief with only pansies for my thoughts and a bit of wilting
rosemary for remembering,
pray, love, remember.
"Go
to, I'll no more on't; it hath made me mad."
-Hamlet from Hamlet, Prince of Denmark
by William Shakespeare