Unseen, unknown, she watches.
Wings shaped like a butterfly's
protrude,
painless limbs float free from her shoulders.
Feathers ornate, intricate in design.
Black swallows red swallows black.
Gifts from a deity, for sure.
Placed high above the ring, she sees all.
The crowd do not see her.
The competitors, both man and beast, they are blind to her.
Well. Perhaps the beast senses more.
This is her game.
She delights as the sunlight dances upon the red velvet.
Morbid.
The black shadow that is the beast lunges forward,
and like a cat, his taunter moves away.
The crowd yells.
Men cheer, women scream, children hide in fear.
Carmen, perhaps, does all three.
A silver woman dressed in red dances the tango with man,
the beast, dripping with sweat, grows tired.
A roar erupts from the crowd as a clatter of metal rings in the vanquishing of the beast,
the sword plunges down, no longer hidden.
The beast, tired, feels no regret at it's last attempt.
A dying victory for both as devil's horns pierce the hide of the gloried man, before their wearer is carried off to a place of no return.
Carmen moves in now, guiding a melancholy spirit homeward.
She's done this countless times before.
His family drown their sorrows in cheap wine and roasted bull-meat.

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