Mad Women

Painted nails, electric blue hair; lives up by the hill in her solitary lair.
Velvet mouth, words uncouth; defiant eyes,sinister vice.
"Painted her wedding dress a key lime green. What a scandalous display indeed."
"Walks through town in her shimmering dresses that may as well be satiny slips...oh good God, look. Look at that cigarette hanging off her lips."
You will see her, you know, in the shadowed parts of town, dallying with her lovers at the break of dawn.
You will see her, you know, the moon shying away from her eyes. Staring out at the midnight sea like a figure frozen in time.
You will be hers for the night, trapped in the witchlight of her wicked lies.
Stolen kisses, whispered promises; masquerade charades and shredded bodices.
She will be gone before sunrise, every tease of her lips a disguise.
It's her way, she'll weave beautiful tales; leave you shackled in the grip of her magical chains.
It seems she carried all that within, a contradiction beyond your wildest dreams.


"The husband was such a good man, too. Shame he died so young of the flu."
There were vicious sounds of his belt slapping against her skin at night; her sacred vows buried somewhere underneath that gravesite.
Brothel visits and screaming fights, red stains on his collar and bruises on her pride.
A heart gone up in flames, the ashes remained. From the smoke, emerged a witch untamed.
"Well, that's no good excuse to go strutting around like a common whore. Forgiveness is a woman's chore."
It's the princesses that shear off their golden hair, pricked by spindles and stares.
Their dreams and souls, caged in fairytales and folklore.


In the humble dazzle of autumn, amidst leaves of cinnamon red and muddy brown;
he was laid to rest beneath the stony ground.
And in the melody of her keens and cries, her cackles lay hidden in plain sight.
And though her eyes never spoke; I swear I could see, I could fear. That wicked glimmer and her thinly veiled sneer.
It was a few days before the madness took shape; then she was out and about leaving destruction in her wake.
She filled pools with champagne and played dangerous games.
Shed the tullets and the bonnets, there's no women like her in Shakespeare's sonnets.
Gauche dresses, coloured tresses.
If there ever had been something so deadly yet quite so dainty.
Her soul drenched in dynamite, crackling like firecrackers and twinkling like starry nights.


"Oh, hush. Mad in the head. Harlot of the highest order. Don't go making poetry out of that little horror."
She dreamed of time machines and revenge.
No more pretend, she had the entire world still left to offend.
On and on she went, like a radio play on repeat...
"Scandal! Disgrace! A woman of the streets."
With their titles in the finest writing, books with luscious leather-bound covers; memories and secrets and tales of lost princesses in ivory towers.
"Mad, mad, mad in the head! Woman that reads, woman that speaks. Her prospects really do seem bleak."
Gagged her mouth with true love's kisses, bound her hands with rings and dishes.
Chained her thoughts with barbed wire, now she speaks like she breathes fire.
"Mad as a Hatter. Mad as a March hare. Go fight your battles elsewhere."


"Oh, I'll start a battle all right, I'll scream my madness into the night.
My fortress built so high, the curses ricocheting off into the night.
I am not squeals and giggles, not a damsel that will go unnamed.
I am ferocious roars and dragon flames.
The world doesn't like mad women, it likes good little wives. Festering in castles and kitchens, living their eclipsed lives.
The world likes maidens pure and true, not witches with their wicked brews.
So I'll be burnt at the stake, if that's what it'll take.
Make me your scapegoat and stand there and gloat.
But I'm afraid your fire won't scorch the fire within. I'm now made of madness and sin."


"Look, there she goes. That witch, didn't you hear?
Mad in the head, that one. Mad as a March hare.
Painted nails, electric blue hair.
Lives up by the hill in her solitary lair."