1
Helena wore wheat-colored pants and a shirt like clouds, it had buttons. Her hair was as wild as her love, her eyes and skin were dark like the underside of storm clouds.
Her mother Zoe had a thunderous voice, and ruled town in her own way. Helena’s father was no one at all.
Her step-father Hudson wished she’d fall out the back of the pick-up and get run over. Helena knew this ‘cause she’d been told. More than once.
As she grew, Hudson gave her chores, well that’s what he called them. But I’d call him a liar. It didn’t matter, Helena would do every single one.
Hold up the tractor so Hudson could clean the underside?
Done.
With a “yes sir” and a “you’re welcome”.
“Go put down the mountain lion that’s been killing the cattle”
“No you may not take the rifle”
Turns out that all Helena needed in her hands was the baseball bat I never used anyways.
Zoe went and hung that Lion’s hide up above the mantle, only Hudson can feel anything other than admiration and pride when you look at it. These days Helena wears that lion-pride like armor.
2
So here is my advice:
one: sing sweet and softly, with a baritone voice if you can
two: sleep with a goddess, so love and worship can be intertwined
three: be certain you often smell of work and that your hands look and feel of it. Smell of a kitchen, or woodworking, of ink and paper, of sweat or firewood; be sure your hands are calloused from strain or dexterous from play; both if you can manage.
four: be free with your love and kindness, grace does not fall like rain, but it is given to each other like a gentle kiss
3
I found that upward over the mountain lives a woman who I think might be god.
When I first saw her she sang and played violin all at once on her front step,
the song lilted and danced through the pines and over the granite peaks
and all else listened, though I wanted desperately to dance with her.
While we talked she killed a snake that tried to make a home for its teeth
in my thigh, instead she snatched it away and sent it into the dirt
with steel and a prayer that seemed like an apology.
She made me cook for her and told me stories of the earth, and asked if
I wanted to make love later. I said I did as I put a plate before her, knowing
that I wasn’t finished serving her.
4
She sang with an out-of-tune piano,
and made it sound like birdsong in the snow.
It rang out past the barbed wire fence
and the setting sun. The old-wood
barn is where I heard it, but by the time
I found the piano she was gone.
5
Swing down that sledgehammer,
a little test of mind over flesh;
like a Southern Anthem sung
out under Western Skies.
Its context lost when you
hear it sung low and sweet.
The hate sounds hidden.