Medusa
Snakes, Statues, Gods
In the slowly-expanding Goddess series, the Medusa:
Medusa
Come, Medusa, statue-maker,
and I will be Poseidon.
No temple safe
from the tides.
Surge and cast off
those veils,
So our eyes might meet.
Sing your sister’s song
as my flesh calcifies.
Kiss the advancing rock.
And take pleasure
on it’s immutability.
The eyes,
the eyes must be the last, to see.
Or the hands, to feel,
Or the lips, to kiss,
Or the tongue, to whisper…
Memory is its own appeal
and your eyes cannot be richer green
nor your hair more golden.
No, we will fasten the veils close,
and forge manacles of coral,
chains of sea-foam:
my hands no higher
than the curve of your neck.
Or come and be Scheherazade.
Weave tales of love and intrigue
and the fragrant gardens of Persia:
One thousand and one
reprieves.
Helen
Helen
When you were here,
when I could take your hand and
gently kiss the tips of your fingers,
you did not need a name.
I called you Love with every glance, touch, exhalation.
Today a body of water lies between us and
without your name my voice goes unraised
in protest at your removal.
Call yourself a siren and I will drown for your song.
Call yourself Circe and beguile me.
Call yourself Medusa and
though it would be my last,
I would tear the veils from your face and
my statue would bear such an expression of ecstasy
you would be lauded as the greatest of sculptors.
And if I should call you Helen
I would call myself a multitude:
man a thousand ships,
set sail for your shore,
lay siege to the walls of your indifference.
If I should call you Helen
I should call myself Ulysses:
it will only be through your surrender
I can return.
It will be no horse,
but something…
something…
Freyja
Lady of the Vanir,
Purveyor of the mystic arts,
Goddess of battle,
What do you do with your half
of the fallen warriors?
Those who flock to your banner and
your hall in the land of elves?
Where would you lead them in
your chariot pulled by blue cats?
Does your desire
extend only to those
who battle with sharpened steel
or when it is ink
are the warriors as acclaimed?
Lady of the Vanir
your charms need no adornment.
I am not drawn to the
filigreed gems at your throat
but the lips above them,
the eyes above them,
the mind above them.
Freyja, my hands will not hold a blade.
I will never fill a chain hauberk.
I will never sail to Jotunheimr
and wage war against giants of fire and ice.
Lady, order the Valkyrie to carry me
on their wings to your hall
and until Ragnarok comes
my pen will stand in your service.
I will ride at your side
against the armies of Fenrir,
chanting songs of praise
until the nine worlds are burned and reborn.
As we gather in the ashes of Valhalla
I will write the new songs
in that time of lasting peace.
All the World in One Girl
All the World in One Girl
I unroll your DNA as if it were a scroll
and I can start from the present
and read your history in reverse.
There is an innumerable regression of bodies,
some passing beneath the gaze of Lady Liberty,
others strolling through plantations or vineyards.
In runes I see stories of you
clad in falcon feathers
riding at the front of the Asgardreid.
Beneath ancient Rome
you dined on pomegranates.
You are the mother of kings and gods,
You are the spirits of lakes and skies,
You are written into every script,
recorded in clay and stone,
subject of bardic verse and chant.
You are the earth that gave birth to life,
the stars that gave rise to the earth,
the eleven dimensions of space and time;
You exist in all quantum states.
All existence is in your past
and you precede all words.
In the beginning was the potential
of you.
Aphrodite, Venus, Love
Aphrodite, Venus, Love-
You are like the sea, inconstant,
advancing then receding,
coy. You entice, then vanish,
a siren without song.
When you are caught,
it is in a mocking surrender.
Like a crashing wave
you embrace that which pursues you.
Do not come to land-
I will come to the sea.
We will float, bodies entwined,
as the tides gently rock us.
The sun will descend
through the surf
and set your
tide-drifted tresses ablaze.
Like sea-foam around a rock,
your body will curve around mine.
My tongue will find yours
and you will taste of salt.
We will descend into a
twilight world
and our ecstasy will fill
the eternal night.
Inanna
I’ve been working (albeit very slowly) on a series about Goddesses. Installment 4, as numbered chronologically, is Inanna. I may get around to posting the other three over here, but they are viewable over at my myspace blog. There are mostly from the end of June, so they may be off the main page. If you click ‘Poem Archive‘ above, you can see the list of all poems in the Goddess Series.
Inanna
You sat atop a ziggurat,
feet among the clouds,
mind and tongue weaving
your crafty plan, beloved.
How much wine did you
ply the jovial Enki with?
How artfully did your robe…
innocently reveal?
Lovely trickster, when you sailed
away, bearing the ME,
Enki’s creations and tools,
was there any hesitation?After six-thousand years
You came with the same
trickster spirit.
No wine, no suggestion,
just your eyes
and I surrendered my heart.
While Enki may have
been playing his own game,
I am merely mortal
and hope for some hesitation,
however small, beloved Inanna,
as you sail away.
as always: comments greatly appreciated- even if it’s to say “this sux.” But I would hope for a little more explanation :)
Kali
Kali
Dance, my dark devi:
You are drunk
on life
and dance with joy.
Your passion erupts
in a corona
unmatched in the cosmos.
Your steps are earthquakes;
your glances, lightning;
your shouts, gales.
In your wake, nothing stands.
Dance, my dark devi:
Would that I were Vishnu
and I could spread
my primordial essence-
be a boundless
reservoir
and contain the fury
of your glee.
Then, when you are expended
meet you in tantric
perfection.
In your wake, nothing stands.
Dance, my dark devi:
But I am a poor son
of Satayavrata
and my mortal shell,
touched by
the heat of your
passion,
is suffused,
and consumed,
and burns in
unadulterated,
unmitigated
joy.
In your wake, nothing stands.
Isis
Isis
Queen of the underworld,
I swim through your eyes
as if they were oceans of sand;
as if a vast and forgotten empire
lay just below the surface.
My hands trace hieroglyphs
on your delicate, golden skin,
inking with my breath
the fantastic tales
contained on ragged
lengths of papyrus.
A warm breeze flows across the
Sahara and the Nile
into our pharaonic bower
where, as if in prayer,
I kneel and begin the
Book of Coming Forth Into Day
at your mouth,
and across your breasts,
and across your sex…
To say by Nut, the brilliant,
the great: This is my beloved…
Queen of the underworld,
these ossified wrappings
cannot contain my love for you.
Carve for me a golden heart,
breathe me back to life,
if only for one night.
One Girl in all the World
One Girl in All the World
I am honored
that on your walk through eternity
you have chosen to tarry
for a while,
without halo or scepter,
next to me.
One girl in all the world
and I adore you.
I am an archaeologist
looking in your eyes:
excavating first
warrior women and Valkyrie,
then Demeter, Ceres,
then, within a civilization of sand,
I see the sly woman, Inanna,
thief of magic.
I lay bare the strata of your eyes
until they are brown
and green and
inches from mine.
I would be your high priest
Hathor, Freya, Venus.
I already worship at your feet.
Your body is
the most holy temple.
Though you ask for no sacrifice,
I burn incense
and kneel at your altar.
And you laugh,
and smile,
and cry,
and are full of caprice,
and youth, for today.
And in another
you will draw your age around you
like a cloak;
but breasts no longer pert,
or hips spread from birthing,
or wrinkles,
cannot disguise you.
Because in this moment,
as our hands tremble
and our hearts tattoo a sensual rhythm
and my lips nearly grace yours,
we are eternal, immutable,
fundamental.
One girl in all the world
and I adore you.
