Innocence Lost

She was innocent when you first met

On a scale of white to black

You were the blackest of black

The one they warned girls like her

To stay away from

She was the whitest of white

Pure, innocent

Dreaming dreams of a knight on a white horse

Those falsified dreams every little girl is led to believe

is a reality

But a knight’s armor is hard after all

With silver that gleams closer to black than white

With a sword that has pierced

So many in the chest

And left dozens of bleeding hearts in its wake

She was innocent when you first spoke

Her words were butterflies not quite yet formed

whispered while weaving a cocoon around themselves

So as yet to protect them from the judgment

The criticism, the harm of the outside world

Your words were like a spiders web

Seemingly beautiful, so mesmerizing anyone would stop and stare

In order to witness the masterpiece being woven so carefully

Realizing only too late that they had been trapped

That while they stood so enraptured by your movements

They now appeared to be confined in the a cage

A cage so forcefully welded

Like that of the once desired knight’s shining armor

That despite the calls of onlookers and the warnings

And the signs that shouted with glaring yellow beacons

DANGER AHEAD

It was too late

Words that once appeared beckoning like

A shot glass filled to the brim with that harsh liquid

to the recovering alcoholic

now caused that relapse to occur,

now caused that butterfly to fall back

its almost open wings twisting helplessly

unable to escape the web that became ropes,

now caused that heart to bleed

and leave a warpath in its wake

now caused that white to turn into a sullied gray 

indistinguishable from the dirt beneath your feet

as they walk without care

away from her aching heart 

She was not so innocent anymore.