Fill My Belly With Flames

Unpaved country roads

Welcome, and a warm first hello to the newcomers!

I’m so happy you’re here.

Each of these Sunday poetry collections centers loosely around a tarot card, and this week, we’re checking in with the Emperor.

He reminds us that the ability to solve a problem with compassion is true power.

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Contents:

1. Witch

2. Where the Wind Goes

3. Bunny Rabbit

WITCH

I think that some folks might call me a witch.
I don’t just mean Mother’s vicious word-lash:
The crowds back in the burning times would itch
To bridle my tongue, take away my cash. 

If I fill my belly with flames, not babes,
My knowledgeable hands are made beacons:
I risk becoming a town-square display,
And those torch-holders will not see reason. 

That scene is scary, but the match is lit,
And I cannot help but burn bright as hell.
Nobody’s chains have caught and held me yet.
Children are drawn to me: I listen well.

My ancestors might have called me a curse:
It's the words, not the flames, that hurt me worse. 

WHERE THE WIND GOES

When I was twelve years old, all preteen fire,
The wind from southern hurricanes would come:
I used to love to see the ripping skies;
I’d think about the air in other lungs.

When I was still growing my skin and bones,
Determining what things I’d tolerate,
I hated all the unpaved country roads,
How they made my twisted skeleton ache.

When my young brain was far from fully grown,
Still fresh with dopamine, and full of whims,
It got soaked through with harmful beliefs, though,
It did not seek them out: they were given.

I used to consider where the wind goes,
Cheap linoleum cold beneath my toes.

BUNNY RABBIT

Bunny Rabbit, it’s time to run away:
Root out a space and line it with your fur.
A roof of grass between you and the day:
What are you now, compared to what you were?

Long ago, they called me Bunny Rabbit,
But I was born to be a scorpion:
Tail rising, high-hooked, lethal and legit.
No warren of soft things will call me kin.

Time visits, with her hooded cloak and scythe:
A periodic lesson in release,
An elder god who witnesses my life,
Who remains tall when I sink to my knees. 

I don’t have to work so hard to exist. 
It’s time to go claim all the things I missed.