Dumpster Diving for Your Love – Canto IV
Recall us now tucked in the hills and shadows deep,
Marta and John, with Leo overhead so near,
Words fall short and explanations no relief,
They attempt to explain, to calm Leo's fear,
Yet Leo's heart in righteous anger fully steeps.
Marta pleads, her eyes with fearful tears.
In stubborn silence, old Leo shows no cares,
Unyielding to the truths the couple try to share.
"Father," cries Marta, "no one is to blame,
Our love is mad, our hearts beat as one."
But Leo's mind is bent to end this game,
Refuses to accept and knows what he must do.
He binds poor John and binds his doom proclaimed.
With trembling hands, he dumps John in the canoe,
And lays him on the river, morality asunder
Leo cold and merciless, father to his daughter.
"Oh, Marta, my fair, someday you'll see
This man, like some Don Juan, fills my heart with dread.
His false love for you, poison at the tree,
Like a biting serpent that leaves unwary dead.
I cannot bear to think of your affections when his flee
To some distant lands away and have you seeing red.
My anger burns now so I had to send the boy alone.
Left in his grip, your heart would whither into stone."
In solemn silence, John drifts down the stream,
Bound by ties of lust and patronly decree,
His heart fills with despair, yet still in dream,
Of his night with Marta, sensual and free.
But as the waters flow, like some silent scream,
Toward the Mississippi, with no way out to see,
He can't help but judge himself, condemned to roam,
Along the shimmering surface of this potential tomb.
As months went by, Marta, in anguish sighed.
Her heart torn asunder at the whims of cruel fate.
With each passing moment, her spirit died,
As she mourned the exile of her perceived soul mate.
And while the clouds that passed over turned to endless skies,
Her belly grew with child yet hopes for her abated,
Until at last, in grief, she took her final leave,
With broken heart and swollen womb, and nary a reprieve.
Deep tucked with in the hills of Ozark land,
A tragedy unfolded, three tales of woe
Due to love denied by father's brutal hand,
And flesh bound up in fury's fallacious flow:
Marta's heart, lacking love's water, a desert sand;
Mad Leo's soul lost trying to keep control;
And a little child's spirit never chance to express
No memories to pass on, only eternity at rest.