DiaBLOGue

It wasn’t a surprise
when they wrapped their hands
around my body like
chestnut leaves,
linen bindings,
tatted antimacassar lovingly draped,
I was never so finely adorned.

Last night she lay in bed and read the men’s words while blood flowed
            and spread like a petal, pooled and ached, red as stymied truth.

Every woman from twelve to sixty could have told them life is
            mutable, if they would have asked her—a flutter, a gush, a
            screaming love

they went to Mount Charleston for the sagebrush the pines
            the all-women

I’m no Mormon but ask Google, can you take the Mormon
out of a once-Mormon? I’m Mormon. Former
stay-at-home Mormon mom. A non-drinker

One summer dusk I floated in the swimming pool as billowing
            black thunderheads glowered on every horizon, spitting
                        lightning at the earth as night gathered beyond
                                    them. I willed the monsoon

A head-scratcher for sure
            how to plug us into
                        your power grid

She puts her hands on my head
By the power of the divine womanhood we both share,
And blesses me to love myself, to love others,
To feel power in moving forward,
To see clearly, and kindly.

Brigham is boiling inside
at the audacity of the prophet
who said that God was once
a man.

The girl
spotted a pretty pile
of colored sand