August 23rd, 2023

I see the world inside and out—
envision with the third eye.

I can see eyes while I cannot see mouths.
My eyes will become my mouth.

I take speech from mouths
and creates ways to speak through
the sights of the universe.

We cannot see them.
They wander in spirit—
women who’ve died
in childbirth,
who do not stand still
stretch out like an horizon,
palms lifted up.

They have lost souls—
sing to the sun of tones
ever too high, varied
for human ear:
shoulders too wide for
passage— hemorrhage—
dehydration, death,

Unwanted early ripeness.
Eight months away from home—
boy-child never beheld,
given up—unplanned fertility,
forced early marriage—
resentment, shame,
years of disinterest,

Womb gone to seed—
uterus vacant only a month—
reluctant abortion—
uncertainty, guilt.
Long ago in Mexico,
People asked you,
Cihuateteo— stop spirits.

People traced terracotta—
black, red— give spirits shape—
honoring them like warriors,
having died in battle—
eyes double-wedged,
pupils drawn in black resin.
They wrapped clay skirts

Around them, braided earth hair,
coiled ornaments at elbow,
wrist, ear, and neck.
Cihuateteo, help us.
We don’t know how
to stop them—too many
ways to die in childbirth.

Building no monuments for them.
Their voices moan, weave, merge—
Roam the countryside,
engulf our little children.

*Cihuateteo is an ncient Nahuan goddess of women who died in childbirth.

Grace Cathedral,
San Francisco July 1990

I. Sweet Water
Shane, you told me how you carved from wood,
eight statues of great mothers— scavenged lumber,
hauled logs in the yellow truck we leaned against.

Imagining their figures in a church, arranged around
an oval rock. Asking for names, you said, I knew
them already, urging me to tell what they looked like,

what shapes their bodies took.

II. Willendorf
A little circle cap covers your round wood head,
surrounds your face with four descending rows of
close cropped corn— fifth at the summit, our knob,
your lens.

Immense shoulders slope, ripple presenting a deep
dark dimple— just off center above your breasts.
Eggs are corpulent, uneven— your right one hangs

Like many mothers’ nursing low— full above the heart.
The navel bulges in amid placid flesh, bounty of bulk extends poised upon the fragile tender balance—

Your humble folds, the vulva— crowning plump curved thighs, depressions in the knees. How your humble
sacred stance is carved stable within our bones.

No longer pregnant—yet full ready to give. You are the offering— hold, nurture. The body—our terror— narrow passage leading to life and death.

The body— our solace— takes us, mother— a blind and inward glance.

III. Sumeria
Small breasts upheld like twin cups in a cradle by mute slender hands. The power of seed curves— a delicate afterthought from your swollen shoulders.

Tiny streams of milk lead the way invisibly—to symmetry. The fat upon your thighs accumulates— soft plausible outcome of fertility. A single layer of flax hides your hair—

Crowns a mild forehead. Blank crescent eyes and lips perpetuate benevolence— your moisture wrung from
a stone. Captured tears, amulets wind in vees around

Your neck, hips, knees. Waist, belly remain slight, unveiled. What you balance on tight rigid calves,
sustains us, juice—welcome as a double pear.

IV. Laussel
Out of the cave, without benefit of light or facial features, from the low depths of the body, you rise from the wall—right hand embracing a bison horn incised thirteen times,

Moon wax, left hand resting on a full ripe belly. Two wrinkles curve, deepen plenty through shoulders, midriff. An animal has fed you well. Expectant crevices beneath

Your breasts breathe, smile. In a thick, heavy slumber—
we creatures wait here.

V. Nile
Arms coil, pray like wings, beseech healing rain—fall
upon your little snake head. Your breasts birds wet with praise— all that is new on the river—your flat torso,

Supple banks— love floods our delta.

VI. Lespugue
Ivory breasts, buttocks, thighs repeat themselves—gifts that spirits leave us must be returned.Your small head bows in concentration, snake limbs press down

The sagging chest over the sad and vacant region of loss. With simple feet tucked in, you push to bring the zone of eggs to life before the rest.

VII. Thrace
Seated on a round clay stool, you fold modest hands over your lap, our throne. The slight nipples coil close to center, guard our dreams like shells protect the snails.

Supplicant, you lift your face— hook for the sun. Radiant straight hair flows down your back to where bold lozenges surround a sacred cleft. In front, meanders dip, rise, and

Cross pain-soft secrets. In ample balance, here your hips yield, whisper— how staunch the ground beneath columns of your little hoofed feet.

VIII. Yoruba
Your oval face is all we know— your dark body harbored still within the tree— sacred as sap. Three wrinkles tilt across your brow, tributaries of regret. Black lakes,

Your eyes, our mirrors, glisten damp with heat. Opulence of breath swirls from a long flat nose onto broad moist lips. Sultry shadows in your mouth, honey on our barren path.

IX. Cyclades
Your nude body stiff— white as our spirit death. In life, we clutch your blind face as our shield. We grasp your nose, our handle, and climb steep, out of breath as any alpine

Ridge. Your neck, a cylinder of desiccation, lets us pour marble hate upon your breasts, lethal piles of sand, each an hour glass.

Straight and parallel, arms of resignation enfold as we carve on you the triangle of our doom. Schematic legs
no longer hold you on earth to fetch us with your song.

Summer solstice just past,
and Sirius, the star of Isis,
rises invisible in the morning.

The sun’s immense gold rays
wilt the flowers to announce
the time Isis mourns the loss

Of her soulmate. Her torrent
of tears floods the delta. Ever
these dog days bring me to

My knees begging for mercy.
No sooner do I cry out wild
on the wind then he goes.

Tears roll down my face,
waiting, wet, hot with salt
and salvation.

October 10th, 2014

I am keeper of the mysteries.

What I know is understood only
in imaginal realms, in silence.

I know why the seasons turn—
how truth is not fathomed
in clean, neat sentences.

I keep secrets to myself—
containing multitudes,
embracing opposites,
formed from paradox.

I persist ever with enigma.

The dances I step to are
life, death, rebirth.

The metaphor is my landscape.

June 30, 1991

You, Isis, upon hearing Osiris was betrayed
and made to lie in a chest of art, sealed, cast
spiritless into the swollen brown Nile, carried
along to its Tanaitic mouths, cut off your black

Hair endless in grief, set out alone. In the length
of your ardor, you traced his path, reached the town
of the papyrus twin where the sea had placed him
gently within the branches of a tamarisk whose trunk

Encircled him in safety. In time, the tamarisk grew massive— beloved by Queen Astarte, felled as a pillar for her roof. You, Isis, soon learned the tree was cut, entranced royal maidens with your sweet odor.

Let you nurse Astarte’s son, you bestowed Fragrance
on their hair. Each night you gave the squalling babe—
not breast— yet finger for suckle until milk-drunk sleep overtook. You cast the child into flame. You, Isis, who would protect his limbs, spoke mighty words,

Turned into a swallow floated, dived, moaned. One night Astarte found her jeweler— child on fire, cried deprived him of life everlasting. Even so, you, Isis told Astarte
your story, begged for the pillar, received it gladly.

Having cut it open, you took out your husband’s body, departed for Egypt, bore it over sea and the falling
Nile, arrived, hid the chest,
abandoned death.

January 5, 1991

Isis, you married your brother before the dual, ardent reign
while Ra, your father, still prevailed shaking, like damp
papyrus, with palsy, dribbling, keen, hot around
his bulging mouth.

You pondering these matters in your great heart saw dark
in the moon knowledge of Ra’s secret name where power
lay waiting— gleaming body in a sarcophagus.
Ra made all, so nothing new could be—

Yet, you fashioned the cobra fresh out of spit— trickled like
dew down a ponderous chin into the dust by the road
where, each morning, wobbled, trekked from Upper to
Lower lands. You knew to gather moist clay, to shape in
image of a shrouded snake,

Set in the fire of midnight— hiding in the grass along the
way, Ra accustomed to walk. Morning came once more,
as you would have it. Light fell out of Ra’s eye, gave life
to what you molded. Cobra reared its occult head, struck,
slid away.

The cry of Ra rang out— all came forth to enquire what
troubled the sun. Something wounded him— he did not
know— asking for magic, for spells — one by one
they came, yet, pain grew fierce and deep. At last,
he turned to you, who

Humbly asked if it were a snake that stabbed him. He did
not see a serpent— he did not make with poison— he did
not know. Its venom was not fire nor water though
the blood pulsed colder than water.

Next veins melted, liquid hotter than fire. The eyes are
clouds, yet the head sears with beams— ice yellow like
winter. He spoke in turn his names, all he made, heavens,
earth, the seas, horizons, dark, light, the great river, all
living things.

Besides that Khepera, the dawning, Ra the noon, and
Tum, the shadows of evening falling over. The poison
seethed on. You begged he name the Secret one. Ra
made you swear that none would know the name—
save Horus— the son you would bear Osiris.

With an oath, so given, the name passed, double—
whispered from his Ka to your great Ka. The name was
not amen. It has never been known— yet, it was the body
of the name whose hidden part was Ka. You mingled
knowledge with your spell and

The cobra’s poison faded as the sun’s rays. Ra severed
his reign on earth, took his place in heaven where, by day,
he crossed from east to west— by night he passed under
the earth through the Duat.

You, who learned the name, ruled with Osiris, taught those
who would retain to sow and reap barley and wheat, to
grow date and grape, to embody love, to honor Amen-Ra,
to build temples.

I would protect you with the north wind, which I
make beating my wings strengthening your throat,
which has closed.

Come then unto me. Possess obedience. Draw near,
weep in your great misery. Life is given to one, who is
led by another.

Come forth this season of evening, I walk barefoot
with seven scorpions — Tefen, Befen twice behind
me. Continue at my side. Mestet, Nestefef near me,

Petet, Thetet, Maatet leading the way. I cry out to them loudly.
“Let your faces be bent down on the way.”
My words reach their ears. Praise obedience.

Leaders of the company of scorpions bring me to the
papyrus swamps, to the city of two-sandal goddesses.
We reach the houses of the woman of the governor.

A noble woman has seen our march — angry with our company,
closes her door. Tefen places poison all at
one time on his tail. A poor woman opens the door.

I enter. With cunning, Tefen enters under the leaves,
strikes the son of the noble woman. So fire breaks
out in the house, nor is there water to quench it —

Heaven will rain in this season. She, who will not open
her heart, is sad, walks round the city lamenting. No
one comes to her call. I am sad for her sake, wishing

To revive him, who is without fault. I cry out. “Come to
me twice. A charm is my word having life. I am a
daughter known unto her city, who drives away evil

With her utterance. I taught my father to know.
I am the beloved daughter of his body.” I lay my hands upon
the child. Your throat will open. Poison of Tefen does

Not appear on earth, do not advance, nor enter in.
Even I am Isis— lady of words of power, worker with words,
mighty in speech. Hear me— every mouth that

Bites must fall down and not advance.  At dawn, egg
of the goose comes forth through the sycamore. I will
protect you. My sorrow is greater than all the people.

Come to forth to me, all who are under the knife.
Make your way to the swamps, with your faces
downward, find hidden places. One who has

Shut her house to me opens the door. Now her
child truly shall be sound, bread and barley
shall drive out poison, breath restore life.