in seeking god
it seems like I’ve always been
on the outside looking in
always trying to see Him
in the glittering of sunlight walking across the waters
or to feel Her
in the moonlight when everything is quiet
and vulnerable
god has been an abstract matrix of
imaginary numbers and
unfamiliar formulas I was never taught
and sometimes
I swear the letters mixed into it are just
distracting algebraic words
trying to make me
believe in
(d) all of the above
Category: [witchcraft & wonder]
anything related to witchcraft, magick, spirituality, and philosophy
Lucifer [poem]
the devil is an angel who fell from grace
and that’s the thing to remember
the darkness didn’t come first
his holy light
faded
in the face of glaring discontent
the beauty of his form
a sinful waste in hell and his love
oh how he loved
he could teach you a thing or two
about unconditional devotion
about how to love the unloveable and
embrace the shadowed souls and
how to keep going
when the god you love abandons you
it’s time to move on and
worship yourself
cool colors [poem]
it’s the cool colors
the blues
the greens
the violets
colors that soothe me
playing pressure valve to
these overcharged emotions
this world is a cacophony of life
so many
people and
places and
things
in movement
I seek balance in the shadows
in winter’s quiet
in stillness
anything
to tame my inner fire and
keep this kindling heart safe from
spontaneous combustion
the fey [poem]
you can’t keep me here
human
not with your words
those clever little cages of
please don’t leave me
I see your heart
emotions spilled across my path
rusted iron train tracks I have no power to cross
I can’t help but wonder how
you figured me out
found the fey in my veins and discovered
my secret name
you speak it to hold me here
a compulsion
to stay rooted in this clay soil
until I too wither into nothingness and dust
and you still wonder why the fey
don’t trust you?
glitter [poem]
we are
eyecatcher and
light-twister
a flicker of color at
the edge of sight
playing
both unseen and always seen
thing
contagious
chromatic crystals
made of
aluminum and tenacity
sticking
everywhere they’re wanted
and quite a few areas they’re
not
we are
soft shimmer and
surprise confetti
found in the strangest places
on hands and clothes
and faces
the stealthy sparkle
a stealer of the smallest light
and reminder that every touch has the potential
to leave something behind
like glitter
bleeding magic [poem]
I’ve been a witch
longer than I’ve been a human
this borrowed body
bleeds magic with every heartbeat
a constant ebb and flow of life
this mouth
wraps itself around explanations
of power and purpose
and poetry
I’ve been an animal
longer than I’ve been a witch
this spirit covered
in fur and feather and fin
but I needed a chance
to grow
to change
to become the ripple
in the cosmic ocean
that led to all this
magic
the past [poem]
I dwell on the past
a lot
on the whitewashed walls of
borrowed homes
my rootless childhood with transient friends
and the chance to experience life’s spectrum
between the temporary pit stops called
home
I remember the taste of
summer huckleberries and
the smell of rotted autumn leaves and
the gurgling little creek and
the feel of sand between my toes
and I wonder what I’d be if
none of it ever happened
life a giant question
what if?
honey [poem]
a hundred thousand wings
beating at the air
buzzing
bodies in constant motion
life distilled into liquid vitality
a golden gift
encased in soft wax and sharp stingers
the hidden nectar of flowers
protected by nature’s design
sticky sweetness
drizzled into tea as a reminder
hard work is rewarded
with the warmth of sunshine and
luscious success
a demon’s deal [poem]
A soul is a nebulous thing,
immeasurable,
almost immaterial in today’s world.
The preacher man tries to scare you with it,
tells you it’ll be damned by your sins.
Maybe he’s right.
Or maybe he just wants to ruin all your fun.
I’ll tell you what,
why don’t you let me take that weight off your hands?
You want to have a good time,
I want numbers to take to the boss.
Win-win if you ask me.
It’s not like you have any use for a soul, anyway.
You’ve been hellbound since birth.
Sins of the father,
I’m sure you understand.
Might as well embrace your fate and run with it.
Sell me your soul,
and I’ll make it worth your while.
tonight I am [poem]
Tonight I am empty like
a clean cup open and unfilled on purpose
paused and waiting for something
I am still like
a seed that slumbers in the soil
awaiting spring and the chance to grow
I am quiet like
an unstrung guitar
full of potential sound and
the echoes of past vibrations
I am guarded like
a newborn child, precious and
so very in need of nurturing
while existing in such a helpless state
I am new like
the first line of your favorite children’s book
ten years after the last time
you bothered to crack the spine and
allowed that sense of wonder flow over you
I am strong like
a spider’s silk where
technicalities and reality disagree
in their measure of what it takes to
break the thread holding my web together
the Black Dream, melas oneiros [poem]
I can smell you
your scent tantalizingly sweet with fear
as if maybe you know or
at least think you know
what I am and
what I’ve done and
I imagine it’s hard for you
to close your eyes at night and sleep
knowing I’ll be there in the darkness
watching
waiting
hungry
and you know it’s too late
your dreams
my hunting grounds
your nightmares
my delicious delicacy
so give in
and close your eyes
and go to sleep
I’ll meet you there
Persephone [poem]
I walk in the crisp, cool air of spring
and everything is budding green. It’s beautiful
and bittersweet. Love is
buried under the thawing earth and
fresh-grown grass, just barely
out of reach.
Mother doesn’t understand. She never has,
really. I’ve always been an odd child,
an unexpected hybrid of dandelion fluff and
pomegranate seed. I know she looks at me and
sees a stranger in place of her own blood.
What did she expect? I danced over Death
as the harvest remains rotted in their fields
every autumn. I reveled in the end of the cycle
as well as Life’s beginning. I touched the dryads and
ignored their cries, watched as their leaves
turned color, wilting and falling
to the ground,
a gorgeous ending.
He was everything I ached for. His hands
rough and heavy with the weight of
bringing souls to harvest. Death
never tasted so sweet as his kiss, and I
was gladly lost to his touch.
He knew the ripeness of my
womanhood and
ate it whole.
He made me a queen. Do you know
how intoxicating it is to
hold a soul in your palm, to
weigh its worth? A man’s life is
infinitesimal against the measure of
the entire cosmos. And yet
the soul’s my king has in his keeping
are rubies and emeralds and diamonds and gold
and all of the precious things mankind
tries to collect in vain. He holds the power of
Death
in his hands. No one is immune,
not even Mother. Let her try to keep me here
among the mindless nymphs and
their dancing forms. Let her try to make me drink
of Lethe, to forget his teeth
on my neck.
We are the embodiment of Life and
Death, the divine cycle. We are a forever thing
that even the gods must bow before
and nothing,
nothing
will keep me from my love.
To the Muses [poem]
The ancient scribes before me wrote first of you,
of those who guide the pen to paper
and voice to song.
They wrote of your names and deeds,
extolling the virtues of your creative grace.
I am nothing like them.
I am a digital scribe, a lost child
in a world overfilled with meaningless words
and forgotten stories.
My tongue won’t wrap around your stories
like vines around a tree,
because my spirit hasn’t walked with yours
and embraced the beauty of your inspiration.
I am limited, but I am open.
Hear me.
Listen to the words of my spirit
as I attempt to reach across the ages
and find divinity.
I may not know your names,
your powers or your praises,
but I know the way it feels when the creative juices flow
and fingers dance across keys
and everything distills down to me
and the story
and the words
as they burst into being.
Writing is the magic of the gods,
given to humankind like a torch in the night.
For that light,
I am grateful.
Larissa Lee 