Emilie Autumn

Sonnet I
Dreaming from my tower
In the air
Higher than the trees
Surrounding close
Wondering if men
Would find me fair
Footsteps down below
Break my repose
The mist about my window
Hinders me
From viewing
Who would enter in my court
But so few visitors I chance to see
Intent I am
On making my report
And tuning my sweet song
Towards the earth
I’ll change my fate
Which left me here since birth
Sonnet II
Six notes
Only had I sounded
When
The footsteps came nearer my prison wall
Trembled I
Yet sounded them again
And from what seemed the pit of earth
Heard call
A voice
Quite different
From those I had heard
Though I could count that number on one hand
My lips
Too dry to speak a single word
I wondered
Why I had not better planned
And tried in vain to step back from the sill
For something held my hair
And kept me still
Sonnet III
I tried to scream
But sound I could not make
My frightened wit had robbed me of my speech
I thought of how my tresses
I might break
But spied the scissors
Just beyond my reach
Frantically
I fumbled through my skirts
Searching for my dagger in the fold
The same I used
For tearing linen shirts
And as I knew
Not what of me had hold
To sacrifice my braids
I raised my knife
Too late!
I now must kill to save my life
Sonnet IV
My point directed at the stranger’s chin,
No time was left for severing his rope
But shall I murder him
Or let him in?
I was too stunned at what I saw
To hope for some salvation
I knew I was lost
Whichever was my choice
It mattered not
The mist had cleared
My innocence the cost
And for one endless moment
I was wrought
Of human flesh
And human cares and fears
The fantasy of fables
Read for years
Sonnet V
A face it was
Yea, it had lips and eyes
But unlike that which greets me in the glass
In its twin orbs
I saw no less surprise
And so we stood
Two statues made of brass
I gazing in his eyes
And he in mine
As though we might have read each other’s thoughts
He smiled slowly
As one
Drunk with wine
When suddenly the forest rang with shots
The hunters oft’ before had come too near
And so I bid adieu
To all my fear
Sonnet VI
Hardly knowing half of what I did
But well aware the half
I knew was mad
I grasped his arms as virtue may forbid