Perhaps the worm knowsthe songbird’s decaying boneswill feed her own daughtersfor generations to come. Maybe she willingly sacrifices herselfto its melody:A cadence we all knowbut choose to forget.
Lunar Freedom
I pity the girl who danced to your rhythmsthinking it was she who created the beat. Your dance is unsafe, unsettling. On a new moon I drift away silently,using the dark to my advantage.Farewell you who once knew me,a stranger to me now.By the full moon you’ll be howling,your outbursts mimicking the tides. I twirl …
Weeping on a Clear Day
Grief is not limited to the months After funerals. The psychic corpses that litter my mind outweigh the physical corpses I have held in my hands. These corpses can include — Letting go of the sister I always wanted First years of life stolen by depression No soft hands on my back as a child …
I Will Teach Her to Remember
A quick search reveals thatJanet and Condoleezza never marriedand never had children. So I traded their blazers for aprons. This choice, my choice, is conscious.My womb was built for this job:raising healers, creatives, and lovers. Raised by Murphy Brown and Oprah,you told me I have to choose.So I choose them, all three of them. Even my …
When You Are Thirsty
Like a new day dawning Morning dew glistening The rainbows of light glimmer through my windows at sunrise I take a deep breath I exhale I am at peace To dance wildly and intimately With my pain As it continues to haunt me As it pounds on my door, And to know truly It is …
Patchwork Patterns
Patchwork Patterns I once told a wise woman about some unhealthy patterns I’d fallen into. A week later she came back with this: instructions to draw straight lines, then curvy lines, then circles, then stars. “Just follow what your hand wants to do.” So I did. It was chaos.Then she told me to look at …
On Transitions
Is it the loss you feelOr the fear of this societyThe one that paints rooms in blueand pink huesPuts people in boxesFor safety and comfort If you do not fear lossThrow some milk weed in the gardenWatch as the seasons shiftFrom dark to light From winter to springAnd ask the monarchAs it soars in the …
My Spirit Does the Heavy Lifting
There are but 2 people with whom I trust my darkness. When I am in that fitful state I have come to know As I thumb through that list Looking for someone to call My name does not appear. The I that is entangled In he said/she said, Judgment, Loneliness, 1 am thoughts racing in …
A Warrior Child
I keep thinking she’s dead The little girl who manages Directs and protects the spiritual direlects She keeps popping up On long drives With the right song After the holidays When the dishes are clean And the family has left She shows up again and again I wrestle her in fits Insisting I don’t need …
Feminism
I am thankful for the women Who stand up in courtrooms Who march in the streets Who do not accept forceful advances I am thankful for the women Who do not use their bodies as products For sale I am thankful to put down slut shaming, An ancient form of self policing and self governing …