Page 139 - Dark Matter Women Witnessing

made up, a reflection not of her,

but of me. She looks back, laughs,

teases, leading me somewhere

I’m not sure I want to be led.

Her arm moves in a circle,

slow and deliberate, a ritual.

There is a trail. Others to go with.

Food is prepared by women

silent as stones, smiling

like pebbles in water.

Time passes and we return,

she and I, to the place where she

walks away and I do not follow.

Yet each time I go a step farther.

V. Journey

The tiny salamander reappears,

runs circles around the foyer.

How he gets in is a mystery.

Released to the backyard,

he vanishes into nature.

The great white remains at large.

But in my poems, sheet after sheet,

ceremony stones fall into place,

feet blaze the path ahead,

lungs expand into deathless space,

each word an open mouth

that demands: Burn. Defy.

Rise. Leap.