engraving antigone’s tomb

I touched the divine and let it rot me inside out,

looked at the man and knew I could be more

with my hands mudstained and bloodstained;

Creon, you know your delusions will destroy you.

Blind crone of a mother gave me the blood in her veins and said,

“You will die for nothing, but the hopeless will make you their saint.”

Take the wedding veil and the noose;

they serve the same purpose,

Haemon your sword will save no one but yourself.

Hate the father more than yourself, hate the self you were moulded to be,

it’s still love even if it’s only found in the grave.

Hate the father that sees you as a tool,

Hate the father that gave me that stone heart;

I know my brother didn’t love me but I was divine.

I could rise above conflict with my knees in the dirt.

Sister of mine forever stuck in dawn,

another girl that could only offer words not hands not bone.

You will die for nothing.

In nothing I am eternal.

Death is divinity is more than these sun-bleached bones--

I bury my wretched brother, another victim of our crime scene life

let the guards shackle me before Creon, king of men but not women.

Antigone is remembered with the gods’ hands on her shoulders,

Justice rising in her throat and Mercy in her broken fingernails.

Antigone dies and lives eternally;

stubborn martyr of a girl who should have known better.