Book Review: The Butchering Art by Lindsey Fitzharris

I firmly believe, now more than ever, that I exist in my own made up fairy tale land. In it, things are not what they really are but instead are …

Happy Obligation Day

Every store has circulars and signs explaining how best to use your money to prove your love for your mother. Instead of being inspiring, these endless suggestions make Mother’s Day seem like an obligation.

And like Victory Gin, holidays of obligation leave a bitter taste.

I Remember

I Remember

Sometimes I stand in the shower

Cold water turned off

Scalding water raining down on me like cinders

My skin goes through a transformation

Milk white, then new born pink, then cattle brand red

In that moment when all the blood rushes up and my skin threatens to bubble,

I remember

I remember the cords around my wrists

The way the sap from the stake penetrated the hand spun cotton of my dress.

How many people there were gawking, both aroused and appalled

Hiding behind and covering their eyes with their holy claims.

The urgency in their eyes,

the hunger that would have pulled my meat from the bone if the flames didn’t take.

I remember the rush of heat, of pain, of cosmic elation as the smoke found a new home in my lungs,

throwing out all the oxygen that has once resided there.

It thickened my blood and blocked my nose,

Fervent prayers weighing down the blanket of flame

that consumed me.

I remember I was gone before the body was done,

before my meat and fat had melted like candle wax

the salivating audience ,ready for my ashes got them on their tongue

proof they saw an abomination erased, stayed until the moon rose high

my body becoming the smoke that itched their nose and stayed in their clothes for weeks to come.

I remember they put my remains with the animal waste

and then wondered why their crops didn’t return, even with the manure.

I remember the cries of hunger, of pain, of violation as the little village

became nothing more than an empty field again.

You say you’re the granddaughters of the witches they forgot to burn.

I was burned.

And I remember.

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Poetry has long been a love of mine.

It started with my love of country music. In grade school, I was convinced I was going to grow up to be a songwriter. I’d write song after song, no music just lyrics. It wasn’t until I was in the middle of my depressive preteen years that I figured out, lyrics with out music are just a poem. I devoured poems (and paper writing my own) throughout my teenage and young adult years. Then adult life struck and being a mom and wife forced my writing to go into hibernation. That seems to be changing now. Some of it has to do with reading Lisa Lister’s  book Witch. Some of it has to do with having some amazing friends who inspire me every day to be more authentic. Some of it is because I’m waking up. And I’m thankful for it all.

#wakethewitches