The Goddess in the Underworld 2010

I was tossing and turning in my rocky bed.
It wasn’t visions of sugarplums dancing in my head.
The longer I slept the more my mind was filled with dread
When in the middle of the night, midnight, a voice said,
“Poor man.”
I was floating up above and could see I was dead
The panic in my chest was being fed
By memories of darkness and light and that led
To philosophers and poets and something I read
About yin yang.
Poor man.
No yin. All yang.
I clawed my way to the top of the bottom of the heap
Where I learned the art of how to keep
A spark of light alive in the dark of the deep
Chasm that opened beneath my feet
I discovered that opening was more than a well
As I slipped at the edge and tumbled and fell
And my voice was silent ‘cause there was no one to tell
That just because it’s private doesn’t mean it’s not hell.

Then you came to me, gagged and bound. You
Wore nothing at all but the pain that hounds you—
The source of which still confounds you
‘cause there’s simply no reason for the empty around you.
Poor woman.
You carried a grudge for all that you’d lost
And wanted to blame me for all that it cost,
But I cut the cords that bound you and tossed
Them in the flames of hell where they burned with the dross.
Yin Yang
Poor woman
All yin. No yang.
There was a deafening crash when we came together.
Nature abhors a vacuum whether
It’s in outer space or in the nether
Reaches of an empty heart seeking something better.
We reached the heights as lover to lover
And danced in the brightness under the cover
Of the sun. We never thought to discover
Whether two empty vassels could fill each other.

You said it was nice but you had to be going.
There were seeds to be planted and crops to be growing
In fields of plenty where warm winds were blowing
Across the tulips and the love we were sowing.
My heart shriveled up; it was so complicated
I didn’t want you to go; I was so frustrated
Over losing the throne I’d abdicated.
But it seemed life alone was the one that was fated.
Then you took my crown
And turned it around
Put it over your hips instead of a gown.
When I said “don’t leave,” you said, “don’t frown,
Enter into me and you will have new life
As the prince of light and I’ll be your wife
Even though we’re surrounded by a world that’s rife
With terror and hardship and hatred and strife.”

Wherever you walked there was hope and good cheer
And I learned to be brave and to show no fear
Of the haunting ghosts of sadness and tears
That waited below in the winter each year.
By autumn’s first frost I was pushing up daisies
While you wandered free in the places
I’d come to love; it just drove me crazy
That I was again consigned to hades.
But now there’s the hope of life anew
If I just have the courage to wait a few
Months until the wheel turns true
And I can be reborn to be with you.
Because that’s the promise of the eternal wheel:
What comes around goes around, that’s the deal.
As partners and lovers and as friends we’ll
Determine for ourselves what’s dead and what’s real.