Consider Juliet

Imagine Juliet, waking up the morning

After that first- last?- night spent with Romeo.

She feels sleep dust in the corners of her eyes,

Maybe she shifts because the white sheet

Is wrapped awkwardly and tugs her still

Adolescent breast at an angle. She stretches.

 

You’d imagine she’s no longer afraid.

Now she’s done the deed and that wasn’t so bad,

Softened by the still-nascent flare of her lust.

Or maybe Romeo was crap in bed, reasonable

Since Verona has no teenagers, only children

And adults. But sweet Juliet wouldn’t know.

 

He asleep and she awake, a disconnect

Cuts between them. Juliet’s thoughts turn

Inward. She has parents to disapprove of her,

She is the surviving child, her family’s last hope,

She stands between a clan’s pride and dishonor.

Juliet is the sun. She has sorrow in her blood.

 

Romeo is an idol in retrospect, he will live on

In speech and art and metaphor, but he’s

Just a man born the only son, to the right parents,

Made into a prince. His draw is his richness

And his danger. What Juliet sees in Romeo that’s

Worth everything she is, she takes to her grave.

 

If Juliet, just waking, could see how short her time is,

She would be rushing to soak up all those

Vibrant new sensations, seeing the threads but

Overlooking the tapestry. So it’s better with her

Caught up in the scandal and the plans and

The deaths. It’s better that she doesn’t know.