Hungry Woman Swallows the Sky

She has many names

Here she is 

Hungry Woman

Stung- maddened

Her shrine spoiled 

Her women beheaded

Rooted in the center 

Of my chest there

Is no food, no man 

That will fill her 

Dervish- she rides me

Opens the universe 

With her song as she

Is the source-wild

Untamed-she knows

The heat

The ice

The joy

The weeping

That tender flame

The call 

Everyday I prayed to Her. Not knowing Her

True name. She was blue. She was feathered. 

She was feline. Then there she was emerging 

From the wall- under the great tree. She watched

As I swam in her blue water among Her white swans. 

Lady of cats and birds. I have always known you

The claw marks in my dreams come back to you

The red rose scent of you hides in my skin. 

Ever of bone and feather. Teeth and winged you 

Climb to your forgotten piles of rocks and whisper

All your names to me. The red poppies at my feet. 

I know you even when I can’t feel you. Electricity 

Running along the iron rails. I carve your head

In stone. I feel your bones in my bones and

I begin to sing your song and no one needs to 

Teach me your dance- since you marked it into 

My legs on the day I was born. I see you in the 

Face of every woman- as we line our skin with 

Bone, stones and feathers singing your laments.