Covered in thick metallic plates
A shield against feeling
Anything —
Not even the persistent howl
For agency
For desires you decided had to die —
Knowing that cry within myself
I sensed it
Or maybe I saw it in an amulet
When I brought you to natural, warm waters
Sheltered between lilacs and willows
We submerged our bodies in the crystal reverie
And I called that voice forward
Breathing life into dormant dreams
Now,
Will you put down your arms
And listen to him sing?
All the times I drift away
Carried by the waters of my mind
To the ballad of our kinship
The felt-sense of your comfort
Guiding me away from —
The reality
That I cannot stretch far enough
To graze your face with my palms —
So I return here
I return and return
To my affection turning and tuning
Expanding beyond the boundaries
Of your absence
Sunken and starving, you arrived
Giving more than you are
I brought you to my altar
And lit candles
As you folded
Into
Yourself
Waking to nourish
On the fruits of my land
Gathered for your blessing
For your color restoring
I whispered my devotion
You are the eternal light that sustains me
In the darkest void from which I am born
Supporting my faith in steadiness
Cradled in your glowing palm
A pulse that sooths and smooths
The edges of my skin lose meaning
As I’m nurtured in your care
Your murmur at dawn
Is pastel poetry inked
Against cumulus clouds
Cast on an ancient lake
Awakening me with
Redwoods, clovers, and ferns
Night’s cosmos disappearing
Into the charm and radiance of your eyes
Wild goddess, dusk deity
Give me fertile power
To climb the earth altar
Feel every growing charm
And celebrate my soul’s arrival
With a dark moon fire
My ancestors and guides encircled together
In harmony through our
Cherished song
Ancient rocks
Burn a sacred fusion
Anoint our intuition
With noble breath in dance
Offer us a blossom
For our feast of sweet connection
A tendril nest
Of confluence sublime
Tranquil summer rosebud beneath
Our secret morning
Emerge, yellow sanctuary,
Make life soft like peace
Outside the temple I built
For us
You wanted my embrace
And I wanted you
So we stood beneath
A cosmic canopy
Facing a place between
Chaos and conversation
We brought our hearts
On pink fluffy clouds
To hold and to breathe
A glowing orb between us
In those moments that lasted
You sighed
With a hum that blossomed
In rainbow resonance
Growing hope in the garden
Of safety
Signaling my body to relax
In the glimmer and shimmer
Of our auras entwined
As if we’d met there
Lifetimes before
In still air and changing light
While giving horses alfalfa
A snapping twig turned my eyes to
Feminine power, shape-shifting creativity
Revealing herself
From the forest across dried grass
Entering the corral through its broken-open gate
In high black boots and sleek red jacket
Bold, light steps obscured her behind a berm
I nervously circled behind the stalls
And waited beneath oaks for her next move
Cresting the threshold to follow my path
She reappeared
And sat facing me in the warmth before twilight
Like she arranged our appointment
We gazed at each other for so many breaths that
A new world opened
And she guided me
Into the space between realms
(Cover art by Hannah Willow @hannahwillow.artist)
