greatness
Aug. 28th, 2006 | 09:39 pm
From:: mirror_mind
I am coming towards it slowly, edging its borders like darkness
in moonlight a distant car's headlights cut into a room,
tilting the shapes of desk and bookshelf, making everything cast long shadows.
I am coming towards it the way some people come upon old age
or a friend's illness: with great sweetness, with great fear and tenderness
I am coming towards my greatness like a fool,
like an animal, snatching at its foes with great fear, with hunger and love of blood.
I am coming towards it the way the trickster stands in a crowded room,
abusing himself with his false accomplishments,
insulting the world with his indifference to his failure.
I am coming towards my greatness. I'm coming towards it
like a mountain, like a hall, like a fountain.
these waves are marble here - they move in perfect, immoveable silences,
cooling me with their stone fires.
I am working at my greatness. I am fighting it, despising it,
I am actively destroying my greatness
out of shame and feminine evil.
I am stuffing it deep into photographs and mirrors as if it could reside there,
as if it could keep me honest or pure, though it must alter and die,
it must take me with it...
I am coming towards my greatness.
I am stumbling towards it, dancing, staggering.
I am turning black inside with greatness - I am not gilded by it, nor I am blessed.
I bear it, quietly, like a cart taking a load of children into the woods.
I will not be infested by it, made pregnant with it, vilified.
I won't carry it in my heart or chest but in all the little cells of the body,
shedding and multiplying, leaving me nothing to trust to but the security of repetition.
I am coming towards my greatness.
It will not tug me like the weather over a planet's skin
Small things will still undo me, hatred will light me up every day,
I will not conquer my enemies nor suddenly be in league with my heroes.
If anything, greatness will make me smaller, more alone,
living in a place only imagination can name, where even empathy swells and dies.
I dream it is the face of fear, I dream it is the face of love
Even now, she moves out there in the silk night, ambitions tucked into her dark pockets,
hating and loving me both, reading down her list of names
with her blind and unforgiving eye...
in moonlight a distant car's headlights cut into a room,
tilting the shapes of desk and bookshelf, making everything cast long shadows.
I am coming towards it the way some people come upon old age
or a friend's illness: with great sweetness, with great fear and tenderness
I am coming towards my greatness like a fool,
like an animal, snatching at its foes with great fear, with hunger and love of blood.
I am coming towards it the way the trickster stands in a crowded room,
abusing himself with his false accomplishments,
insulting the world with his indifference to his failure.
I am coming towards my greatness. I'm coming towards it
like a mountain, like a hall, like a fountain.
these waves are marble here - they move in perfect, immoveable silences,
cooling me with their stone fires.
I am working at my greatness. I am fighting it, despising it,
I am actively destroying my greatness
out of shame and feminine evil.
I am stuffing it deep into photographs and mirrors as if it could reside there,
as if it could keep me honest or pure, though it must alter and die,
it must take me with it...
I am coming towards my greatness.
I am stumbling towards it, dancing, staggering.
I am turning black inside with greatness - I am not gilded by it, nor I am blessed.
I bear it, quietly, like a cart taking a load of children into the woods.
I will not be infested by it, made pregnant with it, vilified.
I won't carry it in my heart or chest but in all the little cells of the body,
shedding and multiplying, leaving me nothing to trust to but the security of repetition.
I am coming towards my greatness.
It will not tug me like the weather over a planet's skin
Small things will still undo me, hatred will light me up every day,
I will not conquer my enemies nor suddenly be in league with my heroes.
If anything, greatness will make me smaller, more alone,
living in a place only imagination can name, where even empathy swells and dies.
I dream it is the face of fear, I dream it is the face of love
Even now, she moves out there in the silk night, ambitions tucked into her dark pockets,
hating and loving me both, reading down her list of names
with her blind and unforgiving eye...