Motherline

I broke the line.

From your fragile genes,
Wilma Darlene
transfigured
into
Judith McGraine
there will be
no more daughters.

Your motherline is dead.

I broke the line.

From your history
of loss and misery,
of anger and surrender,
there will be no more
women carrying
your burdened story
into tomorrow.

Your motherline is dead.
It dies with us.

I broke the line.

Never wanting to carry it forth,
even at five years old
I knew I’d be no nurse,
or teacher or mommy,
and though I have nurtured
others’ souls and selves,
they were the souls and selves
of other motherlines,
and those of fathers too.

Your motherline is dead.
It dies with us.
No daughters follow me in procession.

I broke the line.

Feast, Wild Ones

Feast, wild ones
in the halls of those
who have gone before you.

Know the healing
of your essential self
as your soul moves
between the worlds,
even as the molecules
of your physical self
seeks once more
their place in the reservoir
of elements supporting
the life and beings of our world.

Feast, wild ones
in the halls of those
who have gone before you,
who wait your arrival amongst them.

Treecestors
Lioncestors
Elephantcestors
Squirrelcestors
Badgercestors
Bluetitcestors
Hibiscuscestors

Those of the clan and kind
of any wild being,
animal or plant,
who this day makes
the perilous and liberating journey
across the divide between
life and death,
living and dying.

Feast, wild ones
in the halls of those
who have gone before you,
who wait your arrival amongst them,
who know the trauma of leaving life.

Go free each of you,
those poached or trapped,
those culled or hunted,
those lost to disease,
to accident,
to predation,
I mourn your loss;
each of you was part
of a place, a pride, a family,
a herd, a sett, a nest,
and your absence will be felt
by those who will not see you
again in this life.

Feast, wild ones
in the halls of those
who have gone before you,
who wait your arrival amongst them,
who know the trauma of leaving life,
who now welcome you to the place of healing.