And she sings in a voice borrowed from birds
Clean and most treacherously true
She sings without thought, without rhyme without words
A song that’s unbroken and blue

She sings of blue mountains, of sea and of windOf live gems
From beneath the cracked earth
She sings without words of how sapphire sinned
And was redeemed by the white sky’s blue birth

She sings of blue whales that leap on the foam
Of bluebirds embroidering the trees
She sings of blue smoke soft wreathing a home
And the iceblue of vast Northern seas

She sings of long nights of empty blue sadness
The deep, darker blue that’s depressed
She sings of the roiled blueblack of madness
The joy of a pale Robin’s nest

She sings up blue flowers so Spring can begin
Blue silk in rich markets afar
She sings of blue veins underneath her own skin
She sings of a blue crystal star

~

And here he sees her singing
And he steels his heart and brain
Such a little thing this song of blue
To commute such scorching pain

Forged in the sea, the pact makes no sense
Meaning mystic and message arcane
Yet, it’s steps he must follow, trembling and tense
The checkered path to the end of his pain

The slick sack was delivered, the hissing voice spoke
He has followed it here to the sand
The rest of the world can all go up in smoke
He must fulfil the offensive demand

And here she sits singing, eyes closed in the sun
As if she were tasting each note
Somehow he must do what has to be done
And rip that blue song from her throat

In his cloak is a dagger of cuttle and bone
A dried rose with one razor thorn
A sliver of drab, rain-colored moonstone
And a cup made of silver and horn