A Traitors' Tale

the timeless, although tragic traitors' tale:
her eloquent speech lost in translation;
rhetoric, resounding resignation,
Word for word, all the final detail--
written, rewritten, yet the meanings fail.
Always guilty by association
triumphant in stark indignation.
storybook villains will sometimes prevail

The plot thickens--- and dies, stillborn,
final chapters dusty, read and torn
abandoned fantasies of vapid readers---
dreams extinguished as resentful embers

trapped amongst the story's tattered pages
she the traitor consumes newer ages