Another poem inspired by a Renaissance print about Death. This time it's a sonnet.

Why does this child come gripping both my hands to lead me through the faded evening town, his lantern hissing, soft like shifting sands to fields where once from brambles I wove gowns of whispers, spiny silks of ivy lies for fragrant loves now long unscented? Where are we to go, my child? A sound like flies in bottles, caught in children's fiendish snares is stirring in your light. This dark conceals the hurt of many years -- how in these weeds I first beheld desire... your lamp reveals a withered form. Where is the child? I see the bones through once-fair skin! It cannot be!