psychopomp

I. It hurts

Take me over there
before I bleed everything out:
my violence, my hates, my loves, my light
Stop!

II. Cosmic interlude

You are not your blood
your bones, your feathers, your eyes
says the vulture to the dead robin in the road

III. You are here

My hand can not draw the face that I want
I forgot what you look like
My old hand draws a sun and a tree

IV. The riddle

Beneath the ground there is always a sound
Somebody is always eating; somebody is always breathing
Who is it?

VI. Silence by the tree

I will empty myself out over there
Don’t deny me the pain of surrender
Bury these things with the worms and the stones

heart chakra

I fall in love with what I can not see
It’s true
It’s true
Your green heart bursting with seeds
Bury them
Bury them
Under the mud and the rotting leaves
Be quiet
Be quiet
A song is waiting silently
To be born
To be born
Throw your body into the ground
I know you want to love
But you don’t know how
Swallow the dirt
and the unborn songs
‘Til they vibrate your heart
And mangle your soul
Don’t speak to me until you can sing
Talking is murderous and unclean

Persephone Unbound

The winters lasted forever it seemed
She never wanted to die there
But she was dying every year
Her light was growing more dim
Each time she returned
To the ice, the dark days, and him
Fables were breathed to her by the wind
When she was above ground
“If a sun god loves you, you will be free.”
All lies she had told herself
So she trembled in the sun
Hid daffodils in her pockets
And whispered songs to the trees
but once, a sun god did love her
He bloomed roses on her lips
promised she would never be cold again
but she didn’t believe
So she stumbled back down underground
To die some more in the darkness.

“The wound is the place where the Light enters you.” – Rumi

…

dyslimbia

the pain of existing sometimes
splits her fragile soul
into impossible clones.
each one sobbing in a dark corner
of the universe somewhere
because the sun died a long time ago.
now she is never warm
and the ice storms are relentless.
apathetic shards mirroring reflections of a yesterday
that is really a yesterday of a lifetime ago.
father never loved you and father is never coming back
her mother clone tells the other clones
if only she had loved him more
if only she had learned how to be warm
without building fires
he might not have been so cold
don’t ever let them touch you
mother clone hisses
don’t ever let yourself love them
mother clone cries with icicle tears
but one clone’s heart refuses the ice
and she is growing a sun inside her soul

Nocturnes…

my soul slips out of my skin
every time
we collide
to the primordial compositions
coded into our instincts.
our bodies the instruments
vibrating together
elevating the notes higher
and higher-
high on the euphoric trembling
my soul dances out
touches your light
for a moment.
explodes into tiny stars
falling back into my body
swimming in the dark space.

A Japanese Love Story

Negative blood type O
Warrior princess debunking the myth
That she is a savage clawing at chicken wings
Or the social monarch butterfly
Always fluttering and dying from the drama.
He was deceived, but he loves her better like this
Secretly he is glad that
He doesn’t have to paint like Van Gogh
Or be bipolar to fuel false passions
Or pretend to be aloof instead of committing.
He the humanist.
Blood type AB.
But that is how it began.
The humanist messaged the warrior.

Metamorphosis of a Mermaid

The water was green. Eyes bobbing below the surface. I turned her over gently so as not to rub the molten scales off prematurely. She was comatose in my arms and almost dead. The pain of shedding her thick tail skin almost killed her. They tell me that most of them don’t make it to the next stage of metamorphosis. The liquid fire they have to anoint to the scales sends most of them into shock and convulsions. She isn’t shivering yet, so I carry her carefully to shore and wait. This becoming human is a dangerous thing.

Covenant

The nights I would lock myself in the bathroom
I made a covenant with the tiles
Sealed with my liquid pain.
You were gone, usually.
A pub, a bar, maybe a whore
Getting drunk with the spirits
While I tried to find God by carving patterns on my arm
Except I never found him.
I only ever heard the sadness drumming against my throat.
Until you would come back.
Then, it was your voice.
Loud, lunacy raging
And I would pray to the tiles that you would find
Your way to the bed or floor outside the door.

Shelter

Hiding from the stars before the moon rips my throat out
My voice is terrified
And my tongue is chaste.
The taste of half souls left vibrating
In the sickly darkness.
“That’s what you do best, child.
Honey-child it’s okay
You can sleep for another day
I’ll keep you warm and safe.
I won’t let them ravage your heart.”
The rain crawls through my serpent skin
My serpent heart is way too thin
I never had the the teeth
Never had the poison
Never had the hunger
“Honey-child it’s okay.
I’ll never let them see you.
They can starve themselves another day.
I’ll hide your sorrow in my bag of thorns.
That’s what I do best, child.”