Alice
O. Howell
Cybele
Doubt is her dragging anchor
as she crosses and recrosses
a celestial equator
dividing at the gut
in her, the saint, the slut
as she and all her kin
were taught and so wont
they wanted and were taut
but the sun has other plans
having tasted a solstice of morals
and detected a taint
over the wheelstone
he spins and sobs
over her heels
stabbing into her dark complaint
the slut counts
in beads of sweat and purity
so many has she ringed
in jasper rose and flesh, in part and hole
her band and bond
hot kisses hooped by an interior moon
and runged on the committed probe
in feathered trembling on his festive rod
the saint kisses with reasons
is thus disqualified
and sags down her meridians
of pulsing cold
to be consumed
by taxes, winter, and a righteous god
the slut, the slot, open and shot
kisses for pleasures
nests and sweet nectarines
to be subsumed
she smiles like a holy leopard
knowing he has never been circled by such sinuous spring
by constant slivered silvers and inconstant gold
been this confused
old before young
forgiven while hung
Cybele sings in braids of blooded rhythms
of divided incandescent tides
mourns in cold bread
always in that silence following
a trap sprung.
a.o.howell