Poetry

The Legend of Althea James

This is the story of Althea James

a girl who got caught up in all the wrong games

Her story is as old as the waters of the Thames

one of a strong-willed woman who refused to be tamed

She grew up in a house just southwest of Surrey

with parents who wished she’d grow up in a hurry

and hurry she did—and ran off in a flurry

in love with a man twice her age—oh, her mother worried!

And for a while it was bliss, let me tell you this,

No love had ever loved with the strength her first did

but the gods began to envy and call Althea their enemy,

and they tempted her lover into the tryst of the century

Althea ran and hid from the world like a kid

refusing to speak again until she was rid

of every memory of her lover and the wrong that he did

willing herself to never love again—oh, Heaven Forbid!

But the gods were not done, their fun had only just begun

they were the hounds; Althea was a fox on the run

and run she did—to the American South, and

bought a house on the bayou with trees all around

They say it’s too hot there even for the Devil

but Althea was resilient beyond Satan’s level

yet she swore she saw him in faces all over town

from the preacher’s coal black eyes to the banker’s constant frown

Althea did not fear, though she thought he was weird

But she raged at the preacher when he brought kids to tears

with his stories of fire, burning brimstone, and circles of Hell,

so she quietly arranged for him to go there himself

It was really quite easy for her, you see,

She simply offered to make the preacher some tea

then mixed in her favorite hydrangea leaves

and watched his body sink in to the bayous’ deep

The gods tried their damnedest, but Althea can’t be beat

They set the law on her tail, but the jury set her free

Her peers couldn’t vote guilty on the killer of a creep

And her sentence was a relief to the children he made weep

Althea headed out west into the desert on a lysergic quest

and this hypnotic cosmic jest became clear in her head

Heaven was a test, a red herring mythical conquest

to see how much blood a man would drain from the chest

of his brother in the name of a prosperous eternal rest

It was all upside down, everything up ‘til now

It wasn’t the Devil in those coal black eyes she’d found

It all made sense to her how she could finally get out

of this endless loop the gods chased her around

Althea fell to her knees and looked at the sky with a screech

then reached between her feet where her dagger was sheathed

She grabbed on the blade and cut into her nape

and pulled it to the front until her breath was abate

Her blood trickled quick, on the desert sand it dripped

pooling around her, a crimson mirror it made

a halo of lifeblood, reflecting her truelove in scarlet hues—

the Underworld’s Lord, her perfect bridegroom

Untarnished

The gray cloud of doubt hangs, storming and loud

over my head on a night I could’ve gone out

but the company out there couldn’t help me repair

the damage that was done to pay my childhood’s circus fare

To add insult to injury, the scars did not come free

They were paid for by my family with the clergy’s guarantee

to save my soul for all eternity

And though doubt I may, make no mistake

It’s not for the sake of my soul that I worry myself awake

It’s the knowing little itch that in my brain there’s been a glitch,

a switch that can’t be un-flipped that leaves me hanging in limbo’s grip,

wondering if this tortured heart was made unlovable from the start

and if there is some cure to make myself again pure

untarnished by the words of Gods or men

all their sins unlearned

Eternal Winter

When I was a child, alone in my room

with the fan on high, laying on my bed like a tomb

I’d close my eyes and imagine a place

where the snow covered every surface

and there was no heat to scorch my face

A world where tropical vines gave way to evergreen pines

and the angry words adults speak faded into winds over mountain peaks

where magic was real and feelings were safe to feel

where love was no political stance and strangers could be given a chance

and happy endings were never mere happenstance

Though it wasn’t reality, it felt more real to me

than history relayed in a Sunday pulpit speech

More real than traffic beeps or the teacher who once screeched

when my attention span was weak, preferring prose over parsing trees

and dreaming dreams adults do not deign to dream

I dreamed of a cold that seeped down to my bones

and froze out the demons buried deep in my soul

Eternal winter in my heart saved me from the start

from the dark and the flames planted there by the stars

and carried me out with fewer scars than friends who got less far

Still some days now when I want to cry

I go for a walk while the sun is high

and the air is moist and filled with flies

The sweat fills my shoes and my skin is aflame

but my sorrows are not felt when my body is in pain

And there’s no better cold than the one I design

in my mind in a heat index of 105

The Magdalene Effect

By ambition of nature and persistence of life

the Sea of Galilee flourishes despite climatic strife

So do the women who within church walls grow

between threats of reproach and fragile male egos

where none are slandered more than the Magdalene

– “The Whore”

He came not to destroy but to fulfill

not good girls, meek and mild,

but sinners, sweet and wild

Who else but a rebel, with no father or brother

could freely travel the land in support of another?

The Watchtower of the Messiah, the Bride of Christ

followed all His days and stayed that fateful night

to prepare the body for the time He should again rise

and go tell the twelve who couldn’t bother to wait by

That’s woman’s work – to stand by in tough times

From her pocket’s gold, Christ’s story was told

and seven devils cast out of her generous soul

On the banks of the River Jordan, where the Mighty One came

poor Mary gave her constant labor and lost her good name

to men who recounted her story for fame

Sixth Century eyes couldn’t fathom why

a woman, not a wife, would stand by His side

Without a ring upon her hand

she was deemed a Whore in a Holy Land

Such is the fate of an independent woman whose fame

is left in the hands of men to relay

Men of peace? Yes, but men all the same