Vows to a Hollow Man

Tall and warm figure that holds me close, do you promise to never hurt me, to protect me from the wolves surrounding our home?

Tall and warm figure that tells me his dreams, do you promise to slay all of our enemies?

Tall and warm figure that kisses me every dawn, do you promise to be my friend and my lover, to protect our sacred bond?

Tall and warm figure that plasters a smile on my face with every joke, do you promise to speak well of me in rooms where my name is spoke?

Tall and warm figure that promised me to be his wife, will you keep this promise, and be gentle with me the rest of our life?

Tall and cold figure why toss me to the wolves? was my love not good enough, was it expiring with stench?

Tall and cold figure, why do we no longer speak? Have my ears gone deaf or has your love for me grown weak?

Tall and cold figure, where have my kisses gone? I wake with an ache, what happened to our bond?

Tall and cold figure, why have you stolen my laughter? It echoes in silence now, hollowed, brittle, and fractured.

Tall and cold figure, now mean and a scowler, I await you at the altar for a promise never to be made true.

I am to marry now what stands in your place, the shadow of you.

The lies, the bitterness, the rage, the cold figure sickenly whispers out I do.

So I say yes to forever,

Not to the man that I knew, but to the hollow, the cruel,

The dark side of you.

Your wounds found a home in my chest,

Your fury now lives in me too.

I carry your shadow in vows that we swore,

In a love barely breathing before it was torn.

Your trauma clings quiet, a permanent bruise,

And with every step forward, you tighten my noose.

It bleeds from my hands into all that I touch

Your torment lives on in the ones that I love.