Justice
The hammer, the scale
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Enough shilling, time for some poems!
This week, we turn our eye toward Justice. When this card is drawn, it’s time to consider where things could be brought back into balance.
Where is the middle, and how do we get there?
Consider this for background music:
If someone lashes out against your boundary, redouble your grip and hold
What separation
Has ever not been needed?
It works or it don’t.
Holding boundaries,
Necessarily unliked
By harmful people.
When resolve falters,
Try to recall the altar.
Are you words or deeds?
A woman who moves with confidence is confusing to many and appealing to some
Dominant women
Square up so confidently,
Weakening your knees.
Thought I was depressed, turns out I was surrounded by assholes
When the road divides,
And it’s time to decide
Between isolation and connection,
Giving up or making the best of it,
It used to be so hard for me
To reach out my hand,
All I ever planned were solo missions,
Friendship’s too hard, better not risk it.
I had to stop fearing folks who want to love me,
Folks like that used to be hazardous,
But that was a different era,
And now I have a social circle that feels marvelous.
Grabbed my purple Fabuloso
And I scoured my life clean,
Now my lovely body is so fresh and healthy,
I’m living my dream.
I learned that I can write my life
Just like a scene in a play,
I can get literary.
I can move from night to day,
Diurnal, baby.
Sometimes you just have to make an entrance
If you are waiting,
It might be the time to strike.
An opening yields.
Smack through double doors,
Scrape your spurs on dirty floors,
Tip your hat to whores.
Done with the body shame I Iearned as a child
Make my body your church,
Your temple,
Worship every divot and dimple,
Every turn and angle,
The range of textures and timbres.
Come sit for my services,
Grab a hymnal from the back of the pew
And raise your voice in adoration.
You don’t have to do it alone,
There’s a whole choir singing the tune.
There is no priest,
But there sure is an altar to serve.
Make your sacrifices, let them burn.
Give my body your choicest portions.
Watch the flames lick higher,
When one of my parts rejoins the whole,
We build a funeral pyre
And light it reverently.
Widen your eyes in wonder,
Become the lamb,
Fling yourself onto the bonfire,
Feel the flames consume
And send you higher.
You can’t bury consequences deeply enough to avoid them
They buried her deep,
Secrets they don’t want to keep.
She rose, sweet revenge.
She was a woman
Of ill repute, no dispute,
But that’s no excuse.
Ramblin’ Rose crawled up
From a grave not deep enough
To silence her blood.
She walked back to town
In her dirty, mangled gown,
White, bloodstained to brown.
No one wants a girl
Who gave someone else her pearl.
Other gems won’t do.
Ramblin’ Rose has sinned,
Now look at the state she’s in.
Don’t let her near you.
When Rose rambles here,
Feel your heart well up with fear.
She is Death to you.
Working on the ol’ body acceptance
I stood,
And let the wind clothe me.
I held
Two fistfuls of my joyful flesh.
I knew
Nobody can ever own me.
I walked,
Willingly,
To my final test.
Folks will always be folks
When you plant a hanging tree,
Choose the site with care.
Hanging trees grow roots so deep,
You’d never know the ends are even there.
Plant it at the edge of town,
Clear a circle ‘round it for a crowd,
Plenty of space if it gets rowdy.
You know how those jerks can get.
Not that you’ll see it,
A hanging tree’s an investment
In your belief in mischief,
It’s a trust that after many seasons and rings,
People will still be doing the things
That cause other people to draw them up, string ‘em.
Planting a hanging tree shows faith
That there will be a need
To hang ‘em high.
Bees, no need to sting,
The hanging tree has done your work.
Crowd begins to thin,
Gravedigger turns the dirt.
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All my best,
