Noxious

I was towering and magnificent,
Substantial and unyielding,
Lusty limbs outstretched as if to hug the sky.
He was just a spindly thing
When he asked if he could
Use me as support.

His tendrils tickled as he climbed,
Fresh leaflets patty-caked in rhyme.
I grew nostalgic for the days
When I was thin and lithe--
Bending with the whims of wind,
Reaching for the sun.

Then laughter stopped
As enchantment turned to irritant:
Stalks snaked around my gut,
Vines grew tight like a garrote,
Began to canker and cut,
Leaves metastasize and march
Relentlessly, recklessly upward,
Its inevitability thundering forward,
My view eclipsed by his.
I labor for breath beneath the weight
Of his underhanded prosperity.
I buckle and capitulate,
Swallowed whole,
Subsumed into a monster.