Corn bread’s in the oven
and yes I ground the seed myself,
absent of nuance
because what’s mundane feeds
and if this is my mask, it was not made
but found; ring-bound features freed
by flint, the way my kin carved spirit masks
from living wood, not cut from the tree
until fully shaped.
The art and the worship of it
was seeing the healing beneath bark
and breaking it out.
If my voice is dark
if my voice is menstrual
remember there is power inside blood
which is why the orthodox won’t taste it
even as it feeds nightmares, and
if I name goddesses
I remember gods too, and that moon
is not so much female as she is awe–
that trapped asteroid
is the closest most get to what’s bigger;
some of us have stood there, hungry
on the surface of that tide-pulling
can’t-nourish-anything stone.
I’m with you on the moon power. I’ve been up staring at the moon in the dark small hours. Nice one. Thanks. Alice
Alice–thank you!
Love the way you own that corn: knock out first few lines!…’features swaddled in rings/and freed’ gives such a powerful sense of the way in which you nurture your creativity. This is sensual and yearning. As an old friend of mine used to say, ‘Go [sic] em girl! 🙂
Aw, thank you, FATW. I had to use these lines, own them as they were thrown at me.
That you can own them, is a gift and you own that.
Face, thank you for reminding me. I needed to be reminded.
MS. PIERCY!
Thanks… 😉
and now for my extremely knowledgeable critique… hell I really liked the 2nd stanza. ..power inside blood – pulsing ..keeping us alive 🙂
I love anything and everything you choose to say to be about my poetry, Jen. Oh gosh, I hope that fridge comment didn’t tick you off too badly…it was not directed at you, one bit.
No No No I understand it wasn’t, it’s ok honestly. 🙂
OK, GOOD 😉
The way you link corn and blood and moon and goddess is so striking.
thank you–it was an idea that got thrown into my lap.