Hope

 Hope is the unlived future

pulled by the part of your soul

that believes that something

must work right.

Work right with it

and let it come to you.

Work in hope.

The Jewel

 Formed under heat and pressure

in the heart of a star--

the elements humanity is made of

and what you are,

under heat and pressure

is something rare,

improbable and dynamic.

That we share

this intersection oof space

and time is

miraculous--the chaotic

processes from the 

elemental to consciousness

give me gratitude

to whatever star

placed me in the same world

where you are

and I never doubt the celestial 

in you--I know,

because I have seen the conditions

under which you glow.

A Brief Thought

 As the flowers share the sun

under which they've grown,

the brightest light inside your life

is nothing you can own. 

Vision

 Your eyes, the portals to your soul,

were left open, and I slipped right in.

In I fell, lost in deep water,

full immersion baptism in

the sacred river. The surface still--

but the undertow! Running 

to some place guarded like

the holy of holies.

Escorted out, flaming sword at my throat,

I crept away in my soggy clown shoes,

a jester smile of astonishment

plastered on my face,

psychically thrown by unexpected grace,

wondering if I might return.

And I became aware

of something pooling deep inside of me--

the forgotten eternal spring--

the abandoned depths of my own.

The Wound

 I had been on fire

and still smoke in places

a haze drifting around me

and that unmistakable scent.

Parts of me are ashes

and I don't care

where they went.

Not traumatized--

cauterized.

The bleeding stopped.

The past is a scar,

tough but fading.

We are 

not wrecks,

but what escaped them.

Unheroic Interlude

 The nine sisters won't play with me

so I'm counting on you, gray-eyed 

and far-seeing, to remember me.

Where I left my heroine, she was

cooling her heels in the Land of the Dead.

She'll live (you knew that) 

because Immortals do.

It's what they were fated to.

And as for me, I guess I'll live, too,

if I can figure out my way.

We are skipping from the Middle East to

the Mediterranean, (I've been--have you?

I've seen the rock and the hard place where my 

epic crimson forbear found himself adrift.)

And here's where you find me.

Crafty one, send an owl. Whisper in my ear.

Get my stupid ass out of here. 

Here I am: not in the dark of the Underworld,

but in the bright light of day, 

chained to a mountain of bullshit,

vultures gnawing at my ever-renewing 

last living fuck.  

The mountain is my own bullshit,

the vultures exist in my mind,

and the chains are those I forged in life,

whatever the Dickens that means. 

And I am not sure how to stop torturing me.

She Maintains

 She hangs by her ankles,

iron hook run in.

She hangs by the bones of her ankles,

feet above head.

The dry heat of the land

where the sun doesn't shine

and the rain doesn't fall

bakes her skull

and her soul is thirsting.

And here she is, bereft:

no cloak of invulnerability,

no shining armor,

no girdle of confidence,

gone are her jewels,

her sword of discerning,

her words of power--

even her skin is gone.

The shadow of her tongue longs

for wine.

The shadow of her tongue yearns

for water.

But she can taste:

blood of a soldier

tears of a lover

sweat of a laborer.

And new skin forms over

 the dry chalk of her form.