Once She Was A Poet

Once She Was A Poet

pressed pen against white skin

of blank poetry  perhaps a sigh

shoved between two blue lines

of veins on back of clenched hand

a quake of such magnitude

keeps me from my poetry

she let hem of skirt sift new sheaves

of grasses     wild weeds

warning to take over    her footprints

pressed into damp earth

leaving evidence

once she was a poet

before grief took her by throat

shook her until her heart broke

tossed her into heavy sky

and let her fall where she may

she learned to walk and talk again

after that bad stroke of luck

but she cannot find that tender place

where lives forests of burnt down seeds

supposed to crack open under heat

he lost her    she lost so much of herself

down cracks and rifts of grinding gone 

creaking timbers    naught but skeletal remains

one might find      when kicking clods

to suddenly find  partly silvered slivers

of something shook in long ago

it moans    deep in guts and gore

of trampled tyranny by a vengeful god

who plucked her blossom

before it was ready to seed

her wrung hands    before they bled

her breasts dry from heave

like a starving child sucking its thumb

to try to pacify a growing gnaw

what ink could be plied from a plundered well

what tap to be turned     what thread to pull

what hole to dig     what ash to air

what hand to writhe   to pull a poem

from dry dead heart that caved in on itself

and quivers

afraid to set off such storm again

©Carol Desjarlais 5.20.19