The Ice Queen of Hearts

The Ice Queen of Hearts

I suppose my garden turned to stone

on the night when the Ice Queen came.

I thought it was locked safely inside

my lover's warm embrace.

But the Ice Queen came sweeping in

in all her regal procession

one mid-summer's eve,

her mocking eyes reflected in my own.

The nightingale hushed its song.

The roses bowed and shrank

beneath her haughty eye.

Their fragile petals shrivelled into brown.

The chattering fountain grew silent

and still as it fell

beneath the power of her chill.

And as she bent to gaze into the pool,

I saw my own eyes staring back at me.

I touched the face

of the water and it crackled with

crystals of ice, spreading out in marvelous rays,

just skimming along the surface.

I felt the power of my icy fingers

tracing scars in sculptures of stone.

And I am Pygmalion's statue: Tentatum mollescit ebur, positoque rigore subsedit digitis.

(He touches the ivory statue; it starts to soften; its hardness gone; it yields to his fingers.)

So powerful, yet so fragile...

so apt to melt under a lover's glance

or with the sweet, warm scent of his breath.