Taylor

Return of the Mari Lwyd (2020)

“For She knows all from the birth of the Flood 

To this moment where we stand 

In a terrible frost that binds the blood 

In a cramp that claws the hand. 

Give us rhyme for rhyme through the wood of the door 

Then open the door if you fail.

 Our wit is come from the seawave’s roar, 

The stars, and the stinging hail.”

In the chapel,

in a bedroom,

in an alley late at night.

Always facing an inflated

godlike

version of some guy.

But as a girl you do what you need to survive.

You open wider, take the body.

Thank your father, you’ve been naughty.

2 Hail Marys, 20 lashings.

“I’ve been sent to punish you for daring to exist.

You will never know a love as meaningful as this.”

I’ve memorized

the lines

since I was 10.

From the Bible,

from the playbook,

from the magazines for men.

If you should mess it up, you’ll start again.

But, still, they only want

the women

they condemn.

I think that I’d have too much fun in hell.

With the pagans

and the hedonists

and sapphics there as well.

Purgatory seems the better fit

I can’t stand waiting in the corner,

but I do love being hit.

There’s not a torture you can prescribe

that I wouldn’t find

a way to like.

Every single second I’m alive

I’m sharpening an axe I’d like to grind.

“I was sent to punish you

for the way I was designed.

You will never know a love

that you fear more than mine.”

I want you to know that I am hard at work. There were some restrictions I was under, for a lot longer than it seemed, but they are no longer in the way. I’m sure you can fill in the blanks.

I’m always writing aimlessly and lawlessly as you know. But “album mode” is a whole other arena and the games are just beginning. I am working on some of my favorite stuff I’ve ever conjured. Wild to think that it hasn’t even been 2 years since IICHLIWP! I know it feels like so much longer. It does to me too. But there were 2 years and 7 months between HFK and Manic and honestly I think it was worth it. The time I took. And the growth that got me from that album to the next.

Thank you for having the patience and the faith.

It will pay off in the long run.

This feels like my debut all over again, in some ways.

Your love and support have carried me through a time where I thought maybe I only had a few albums left in me, but I know now that there are so many more than I could have ever dreamed.

Anyways, I love you.

Down the rabbit hole I go 🕳️