Untitled (Life in itself is nothing)

Not only under ground are the brains of men 
Eaten by maggots. 
Life in itself 
Is nothing
Edna St Vincent Millay




A year ago, the ground cracked wide
beneath my feet –
darkness clutched my ankle
and I fell into my grave.

It is a lonely thing to live interred –
the smell of cold clay
sifts into your skin, an embrace
whispering of decomposition.

The sky is reduced to rectangle
devoid of the sun –
the rain finds your place in the night
and seeps through veins to heart.

Imperceptibly, your brain grows roots
fine as hairs, thick as fingers –
when it is time to rise, you find
you have grown attached to death.

A year ago, I went down to earth
but I did not die –
I returned to the land peeling off
tattered remains, a ghost of myself.




For Izy's Out of Standard prompt on day 26 of poetry writing month.

Also, for Margaret's Artistic Interpretations on day 27. I selected the picture entitled Bones by a 15 year old in the 10th grade.

Those who know me, will remember that I fell gravely ill in the first week of May, 2017. I received medical attention in the nick of time, but my recovery was a long, slow process and I will always bear the deep and painful scars, both physical and mental, as a lasting reminder of the experience.
Strangely enough, I made friends with death in the process - it was life I had to come to terms with.

The Poetic Stranger

But today, the Rock cries out to us, clearly, forcefully,   
Come, you may stand upon my
Back and face your distant destiny,
But seek no haven in my shadow,
I will give you no hiding place down here.
Maya Angelou, On the Pulse of Morning



I am the worm in the heart that feeds on death
cocooned in the silk of evening tears;
I am the dormant corm deep in the bitter mire
of every deserted battlefield;
I am the black eagle, storm-divided from my mate
flying an uneven course on bent wings;
I am the rocky outcrop above the vale, the vantage
of lonely height, one misstep from the plunge;
I am the poetic stranger you may pass on the street
whose words you’ll never read.

But my mind is open wide to the page of your need;
my eyes have looked upon your death and seen release;
my heart has been dismantled, so that yours may mend;
my body I have consigned to the trenches,
to the grubs’ grim feast,
so that a single creative truth
may emerge from my life’s work
like the carrion butterfly rising from the corpse of history
that knows yet how to fly and shine blue.



In celebration of poetic voice on Maya Angelou's 90th Birthday, and in response to Brendan's theme of Transformation on Day 4 of poetry writing month.

Untitled (Poem for my Sister)

In the branches of the laurel tree
I saw two naked doves
One was the other
and both were none
Federico Garcia Lorca




This poem is for my sister 
who never was born

except as the other half of me
the sole companion of my head
where I see myself as myself
and as some lonelier other girl
whose hands are empty but hold
my own against the bleak return
of sleepless nights and hollow days

everyone leaves me but not her
the voice in my heart that beats on
the awareness in a purposeless world
who bids me pay attention to details
to find courage in natural beauty
and know that one love is enough
my undefeated sisterhood of self



April One: One Love

On reading Of the Dark Doves by Federico Garcia Lorca