We are the
Wives of nightfall
Maidens of the dark
Our lips smooth as oil
Feather-soft voices
Speaking words of lust
Robed in garments of
Love
Our prey who return
Night upon night
Seem somehow less human
Their bodies shrinking
Their eyes unseeing
Clouded by storms of
Sin
Some seek us as targets
For regret, failure, loneliness
And their hands become fists
Maces that free them briefly
From their desperate, empty
Lives
Our words are recordings
That mean nothing
We control volume and tone
No one knows us
All is hidden behind
Sequins and pearls
The lace and showcase
Smile
Then came a Man who knew me
Though I had never seen him
And in him was no darkness
“Follow me,” softly he said
And I did
And came to know him and the
Burning darkness that had
Engulfed me for so long
Fled from the presence of
His Shining
Robert Funderburk was born by coal oil lamplight in a tin-roofed farmhouse outside Liberty, Mississippi. He moved to Baton Rouge, graduated from LSU, served as SSgt USAFR (1965-1971) and now is a retired parole officer spending his time writing and enjoying a country home on fifty acres of wilderness with his wife, Barbara, in Olive Branch, Louisiana. Robert has had seventeen novels published, along with seventy-five poems and short stories in various literary journals.