1575

Elizabeth Bathory, Countess of Transylvania, bathed in the blood of kidnapped girls, believing it would keep her young.
A girl who tried to escape, Pola, was shut in a cage of sharpened knives in which she was shaken until shredded to death on the blades.

Maybe you were naked
in your razor cage,
tiger's blood-stripes across your shoulderblades,
your hips,
oozing, or

maybe the rips in your red skin
mirrored the tears of your tunic.

Were you young?
Did you have brown hair?
Were you beautiful?
Did your screaming make Ferec Nasady
place an amorous hand on his murderous
wife's waist?

I have found no reference to how hard they shook you,
how deep the blades went,
how long it took.

Afterwards,
did she use your blood,
slipping, nude, into that warm memory?

Laugh, Pola, if you can:
I have brought you back to life with my words
while, in her grave, the Countess' complexion worsens.