I remember love, that slippery elusive feeling, delicate as butterfly's wings and just as capable of making the body soar. I force myself to remember because otherwise, the sacrifice was for naught.
    How pretty I was then! Small and innocent with fleece of captured clouds. Like savory alfalfa and gentle meadowsweet, so was my life. An endless vista stretched before me, ripe with possibility. Lemony bright was the sun in my mouth and warm on my back (as your hands would later be).
    Baby, don't you remember that first night, you in your Wellies and me in my stall? Darkness, haste and secrecy were our only allies. When shame ebbed and the custom grew, with book and torch you wooed.
    "Wading out," you read, "'till our thighs were steeped in flowers." (Romantic preliminaries required only by you).
It was delicious being your prize. Is a loving sacrifice more nourishing than one empty of sentiment?
    Knowing flies gathered and the maggots readied for my corpse as you prepared to slaughter. "My lamb, my little sausage," you cooed as you slit my throat (gleam of sage and apples in your eyes). Indeed, the farmer does love the mutton decorating his table.
    I admit, I faltered when your hands closed round my neck, when my bones felt the hot skillet's sting, when the mint jelly was laid on thick. I don't remember love but I like to think that I do. Otherwise, the theft is meaningless.
    Meat in your belly. Butterfly wings. When you have cast me out and flushed me away, like the iron in your blood, my love will remain.