There was a land where lived no violets

There are people there.
You wouldn't recognize them.
Unless you see yourself first.

Dive deep.
Swim hard.

You're as tense as a roller derby queen who lost her wheels.
Quid pro quo.

We had the light a long time ago. We didn't know how to use it. Almost like a flashlight back then. We kept passing it back and forth. Neither one knew how to turn it on or off. Neither one wanted to admit it. Always holding those cards close to the chest. Never go out on a limb.

Shadows...
Dance with darkness...
As well as with light...

When you were little you hid in the closet for hours, wondering how long before you couldn't sit still any longer. The darkness meant something different back then. It had more to do with the jokes you played on others and less to do with the jokes you play on yourself.

If we had a talk show
We could interview each other
Every week
The material would always stay fresh

Where did you leave your yesterdays?
Who did you sell the porch swing to?
All the pictures are slowly fading.

We used to roll the dice
Now we only bet the sure thing
That never got us anywhere
Risk is the only game we ever played right
Just never played it with each other

I've still got most of my pieces. The sacrifices I made didn't cost all that much. I've only gotten stronger. Too strong for my own good, you might say. Most of the time I'm too aware of my surroundings. I can hear their thoughts. I can feel their pain. I can taste their struggles. They don't know I'm the wind. They don't know you're the rain. I only feed them a little. Most is buried far below. No one knows how much I've buried down there. Flowers don't grow here any longer. It doesn't matter. I keep records.

The rats don't pay it no mind.

"It is I / That, lying by the violet in the sun / do as the carrion does, not the flower / Corrupt with virtuous season."

Angelo, I imagine, head in hands, whilst finally admitting to his sins, longs for a land without the temptuous Isabella, the violet who blossoms before his very eyes, but at the same time he cannot contain his lust. It becomes imperative that he fulfils his long-ignored sexual needs; without this fulfilment he will rot, decay, disintegrate into nothing. It is easy to forget when reading or watching Measure for Measure that Angelo is not puritan, merely puritanical in his Catholic beliefs: Vienna was a completely Catholic city in 1604.

It seems wrong that Angelo and Isabella are cruelly parted by Vincentio's hasty unveiling. I longed for them to be together; Isabella's talk of whips and rubies seemed to suggest that she wanted it too. Let both of them throw their religious beliefs into the air; their morals are no more than screens for their sins. Isabella is already tainted. If it be her fate to have her chastity taken away anyway, let it be Angelo and not Vincentio that takes it from her!