082521

scratching Her itch a thousand thousand tiny lovers

082320c

 

Mercury

Hitchhiking barefoot;

people try to give her shoes,

warn her a girl can’t be too careful,

ask her if they can call someone.

They don’t even know.

Part of her religion, she says,

she’s supposed to wear special sandals,

she’s looking for them,

followed the thief from Europe;

yes, her feet do get cold,

but her soles are tough,

and that’s why she spends winters

in the southern tier; her equivalent

of searching under the streetlight.

Classic profile, built like a runner;

turns some guys on,

but she’s never been caught.

Closest she came,

That cop outside of Dallas,

picked her up as a runaway,

thought she was a minor

till he looked into her eyes,

made a grab for her anyway,

but she quicksilvered from his hands;

he never could explain

why he was the one

locked in the holding cell.

She keeps looking for her sandals,

but after all these years she needs a break

from the chase, thinks of trying out

for the next Olympic games;

she can get a forged Greek passport,

she has the looks, she’s got the speed:

even without the shoes,

no one has ever touched her.

 

121416

In Her Country, On Her Seas

When the ship sails into seas navigable only

by adherents of the Goddess,

When the waves dance and rear like the equines they have become,

And profane speech becomes dissonant music that burns the ear,

And the senses of smell and taste cannot be trusted,

So that we never eat when we’re in that place,

Then the hooded priestess emerges from her cabin

armed with a fuming censer and drawls:

“Let’s talk about that offering again, Captain”

And you know it’s

going to be a bad one.

This is one I wrote a long time ago. I think it was published somewhere before, but I don't have the records from that time accessible to me.

053116b

After She Died


Most all the color drained out of the landscape
You hardly ever saw the wild things
Foxes, deer, the small striped squirrels
Nuts didn't ripen on the trees
Trout vanished from the streams
Rain didn't fall
We did everything we could think of
Everything that did not go against Her law
But the crops died, children dwindled
Her temple's roof fell in
When a terrible wind came out of the west

Finally, we found a seventh daughter
She went into the wood, high in the mountains
Traveled everywhere, looking for a new Goddess
And we were dying

We were few and feeble
When at last she came back to us
She shook her head sady
She had found nothing
Hope sank into the sand
But that evening a warm rain fell
Bit by bit, things returned to life and health
When we rebuilt the temple
The Seventh Daughter took up residence there