War with Words

It takes a measure of elegance
to liberate the lexis penned
within a fabled barbed-wire heart.

I prefer to release with a gentle hand
then to have the words ripped from me -
but such is the case when I am conflicted.

I haven’t a shield to protect me from
ladies tiny ankles and their
curly amber locks,

though I shine like a beacon
when my natural proclivity is to delve
into the forbidden dark shadows
where goblins hinder white knights
and gutters are street sleepers' gold mine.

I can only conclude
my elegance is lacking
and my fabled heart
is not a magical playland but a
withered, blackened fortress.

I am not saddened by this emptiness.

For my pen will wage wars -
striking fear into the souls of metered couplets,
raping villanelles and savagely beating
rhyming iambic stanzas to death.

I will be liberated.