Masquerade

"A brilliant epigram is a solemn platitude
gone to a masquerade ball."
- Lionel Strachey

"You immortal fools.." he dared to say
while his aristocratic guests in circles swayed
as he took a sip of red wine to warm his throat.
They all knew Marie Antoinette had debts to pay.
Nevertheless, the ball flowed like a river
that carried a whisper of solemn death in a boat:
They all knew the story of the Lady of Shalott.
But never did he think Lady Elizabeth would fall
as well this extravagant midnight of all.

And so Master Gracey drank in his bliss,
despite all the hassle, gossip and hiss.
"Aye, 'tis a masquerade after all." He nodded.
For tortured souls hid their mortal faces
when dancing, laughing, travelling to places.
Jewellery shiny, expensive, priceless
on his midnight poison, his olive princess.
How easy it was to spot her among the masks and dresses.
How easy it was to seduce her, love her, claim her.

That innocence, naivety and her pure smile.
How easy it was.. and he knew. They all did.
Those graceful moves.. that luminous elegance
she portrayed! That baroque fashion of hers!
That white dress, as if she was to become a bride,
like a flaming torch in the middle of the night.
That silver mask like running quicksilver!
And finally, those dark eyes she possessed:
bewitching, enchanting, breath-takingly witchy!

Master Gracey took yet another sip in his bliss.
High above all, he stood on a decorated balcony.
Crystals reflecting light in the ballroom,
diamonds shattered across the marble floor, around statues.
Tarot cards used in gambling, playing.
Dices rolled across a satin carpet of the colour of blood.
She pulled the Death card to her dismay.
"Oh, Elizabeth, how unfortunate thy youth!"
They said with a roar of giggles..

Colours of the rainbow flashed through her eyes:
all those dresses, all those masks and lies. "Damn them!"
Master Gracey's servant who arrived in disguise.
She prepared herself and once more she sighed.
Their envy, their jealousy, their cruel gossip
that had broken her fragile spirit since she came.
She was nothing but an exotic pretty face,
a portrait in an old-fashioned, golden frame.
Yet she was known, popular, she had dramatic fame.

Unknowingly she surrendered to the curse of all -
a goblet of glass filled with red wine.
Never had she expected a drop of poison in her sip.
A skull so terrible, so black in her sincere mind.
A skull that would eat away at her pumping heart,
that would cause an everlasting scream of misery
once the drink was spilled across a chair,
still in the hand of the fallen maiden.
Her eyes wide in unexpected shock.

The Lady had become the true drama queen of the masquerade.
Much to her disappointment, and much heart-breaking for her Master
that the poison was stubborn enough to dare and invade
her blood vessels, spreading all over the dead body.
"Who had killed her? Who had wished for her fall?
The jealousy of women? Or the servant in disguise?!" He yelled
as he ran down the stairs to embrace his beloved.
The clock struck 12. It was over. It was the end.
No more bliss. No longer did his guests deserve to breathe air.

For Master Gracey had received a sealed envelope
believed to have been written by Lady Elizabeth herself.
And so in his madness he tore it apart.
Scattered pieces of paper flew across the ballroom.
"No more diamonds. No more!
No more masquerades and gambling!" He stated
as he grieved his lover by hanging himself
in one of the towers, high above the cold
marble floor...

Chaos consumed the Gracey Manor.
Swallowed by death, haunted by angry love.
Haunted by the ghost of the Lady Elizabeth
who sometimes still sang a melody that echoed
in the lonely, forgotten, dark corridors
of the minds of everyone's unwanted memories:
the guests, the souls who had swayed there
once upon a time dressed up in pride
of wearing masks to eternally hide.

"Aye, the world is a masquerade!"