Mapping Silver

 

Be pretty…

Paint yourself

into the shape of his eyes.

 

Are you kidding?

Conjuring my mirror

into his vision to erase mine

is silvered hell I won’t enter.

 

Does the moon dress in fear

or kohl its face to appease

night devils who stalk light with evil?

 

I have lines on my face mapping

the journey of calendars I’ve traveled,

dark hours I’ve survived, bright days I’ve danced.

 

My face is my face.

It holds gifts of my mother and father, ancestors,

shapeshifting, joining the unique reflection I possess.

 

Bare or painted, smile or frown, it’s taken several wrong exits

to finally reach the truth, the only voice in the mirror

that matters is mine.  

©Susie Clevenger 2021

The Sunday Muse #180

 

 

 

Finding Myself in the Moon

 

Treading water in the river of moons

I drink gulps of light from my own reflection.

 

Baptized in visions I see tomorrow’s woe

stalking me on the horizon.

A wolf spirit speaks through my bones,

“Let yourself feel fear. It’s the first seed of courage.”

©Susie Clevenger 2021

The Sunday Muse #166

The Welcome Mat Lays Muted

“Yesterday love was such an easy game to play.

Now I need a place to hide away.

Oh, I believe in yesterday.”

Lennon-McCartney

My picture-perfect door doesn’t welcome.

The wizard’s gone vile and wicked enlists

the breath of my neighbors for war

without their consent.

We are an oddity of enemies

who want to touch, but are

divided by glass so we can’t reach.

From my zoo cage of pictured walls

 holding close to what I need to let go,

I watch birds sitting on my fence chirping,

“Now humans know how it feels to lose their wings.”

©Susie Clevenger 2020

The Sunday Muse #100

Poetry is my journal. Welcome to my roller coaster. 

Once There Was a Moon

If I speak in the language of poets and dreamers, 

but profit from the moon, I am only empty words or a devilish liar.

Midnight crawls across the stars

hungry for the moon, but can’t

find Luna’s scent.

Clock hands claw the wailing trees

handcuffed to blind night

trying to free the last dream.

The walking dead build another mansion

with profits earned from mining reflection.

©Susie Clevenger 2019

Real Toads Weekend Mini Challenge