destruction

Daughters of the Earth – October 2022

From Sacred Fire, 1998, by Nancy Wood

Daughters of the Earth, your path is strewn with stones
sharp enough to sever determination from your bones.
Nothing is as it should be anymore. Our hearts
are on the ground. Our inheritance is shattered.

Daughters of the Earth, your spirit is in danger
of suffocation. Old ideas will crush it. Indifference
will rob your house of meaning. Men are deaf
to your songs, but you must sing them anyway.

Daughters of the Earth, wisdom will save you
from being swallowed by conformity. Do not grieve
for the world of your ancestors,
but create a new horizon from the gifts
they left on the pathways of your mind.

There are no dark times – January 2021

From Many Winters, 1974, by Nancy Wood

 

There are no dark times.

There are only people with

sawdust in their eyes.

No wonder they look at

the great rolling land and see

only doors and windows.

No wonder they look at

the tall mountains and see

only a way to make them tame.

No wonder they look at

the endless sky and see

only a journey to the moon.

There are no dark times.

There are only moments which

are discolored like

sand which is wet with rain.

There are only moments which

give pain like

the sting of a bumblebee.

There are only moments which

are as cruel as

the death of an eagle by a gun.

There are no dark times.

I know this because

Tomorrow receives the best in time

Or else it would not come.

The earth is all that lasts – December 2020

From Sacred Fire, 1998, by Nancy Wood

 

The Earth is all that lasts.

We who have been asleep for years

return to plant seeds in abandoned gardens.

We summon the rain and beg for the sun

to release its energy to our care.

 

The Earth is all that lasts.

We who were flattened by our inability

to rise above the wreckage of the past

are eating shadows

in order to stay alive.

 

The Earth is all that lasts.

We who were invisible, except

to those with similar vision,

stand here possessed by our old lives.

We are unwilling to disappear from our origins.

We have replaced shame with serenity,

doubt with desire.

Our skin is bursting with new muscle.

We are one with snowmelt and with Fire.

The Fire of Life – March 2020

From Wild Love, 1996 (unpublished), by Nancy Wood

 

Without love the world would not last, nor would flowers bloom nor

the sun have a reason to burst between the thighs of night.

The fire of life burns on battlefields

and in the misery of souls struggling for food.  It smolders

even when darkness devours consideration and hatred ravages

the innocence of children.

Love means yes and love means why not

and love means the fire of life,

burning brightly long after the universe ends.

I would like to be a tree – October 2018

 

From War Cry on a Prayer Feather, 1979, by Nancy Wood

 

I would like to be a tree

but you would cut me down.

I would like to be a river

but you would build a dam.

I would like to be a bird

but you would poison what I eat.

I would like to be a deer

but you would shoot me for my meat.

I would like to be a fish

but you would catch me in your net.

I would like to be a coyote

but you would want me for my skin.

I would like to be a grizzly bear

but you would kill me because I’m rare.

I would like to be a flower

but you would pick me to take home.

I would like to be what I am.

Is there any hope for that?