Photo by Pratiksha Mohanty on Unsplash

In Your Pepper, Black

Syllabic Alternate Rhyme

If you could be a single thing,
poured into a bowl,
onto my skin you’d ever cling,
grains as black as coal.

You would seem soft and smooth and light,
innocuous — you,
but perhaps I, with some foresight,
could have seen the truth.

I succumbed to your wily charms,
dipped my toes in first,
you welcomed me with open arms,
I tumbled, headfirst.

And then I breathed and felt the fire,
burning up my nose,
like Hell’s own fury fraught with ire,
lungs in heat arose.

I coughed and sputtered, drowning now,
clenched, blind eyes crying,
bleeding tears beneath blackened brow,
no use defying.

And you so gentle in your bowl,
laugh at all I lack,
and into darkness falls my soul,
in your pepper, black.