Two Poems by Marie C Lecrivain

 

To the one I let go

 

You’d be 27 now,

by my reckoning.

Maybe you’d have my nose

and nihilistic sense of humour,

or your father’s dark eyes

and wavy hair.

Maybe you’d love books,

(we both did).

 

I once had a dream,

on your 14th phantom birthday

that I found you in a library.

You searched the shelves

and adjusted books

in orderly rows,

(another quirk 

I passed onto you).

I watched your hands,

so much like mine,

caress the volumes,

and your shoulders tense

as you grew impatient

in your search,

and as you turned,

I saw your profile,

clean, pure, and lovely.

I opened my mouth

to say your name —

and woke to find 

myself alone.

 

Wherever you are,

I hope you know

I’ll always love you,

in spite of my selfishness,

and need for solitude,

and though I am still here

earthbound and wistful,

I hope you’re out there

riding comets to those 

mysterious spaces

between the stars.

 

You are so much more

than I could ever give you.

 

II: The High Priestess

(Rider Waite Tarot)

Persephone is hoarding

all the pomegranates.

I know she’s unhappy.

The trees were pruned 

back this year,

branches blessed

with golden leaves

but no fruit to harvest.

She sits between two pillars.

White means stay.

Black means go,

and the lunar sickle by her foot 

is upright for reasons 

that escapes me.

The whole scenario is, 

as they say “sus”,

especially when she takes me

by the hand, bends down

and whispers into my ear,

“Call me Pamela.”

Marie C Lecrivain is a poet, publisher, and ordained priestess in the Ecclesia Gnostica Catholica, the ecclesiastical arm of Ordo Templi Orientis. She currently curates two literary blogs: Dashboard Horus: A Bird’s Eye of the Universe (travel themed poetry and art), and Al-Khemia Poetica: A Women’s Art and Literary Journal. Her work has been published in California Quarterly, Chiron Review, Gargoyle, Nonbinary Review, Orbis, Pirene's Fountain, and many other journals. She's the author of several books of poetry and fiction, and editor of Ashes to Stardust: A David Bowie Tribute Anthology (2023 Sybaritic Press, www.sybpress.com).