Call Poem by Alla Bozarth

There is a new sound
of roaring voices
in the deep
and light-shattered
rushes in the heavens.

The mountains are coming alive,
the fire-kindled mountains,
moving again to reshape the earth.

It is we sleeping women,
waking up in a darkened world,
cutting the chains from off our bodies
with our teeth, stretching our lives
over the slow earth—

Seeing, moving, breathing in
the vigor that commands us
to make all things new.

It has been said that while the women sleep,
the earth shall sleep—
But listen! We are waking up and rising,
and soon our sisters will know their strength.

The earth-moving day is here.
We women wake to move in fire.
The earth shall be remade.


From Womanpriest by Alla Renée Bozarth, Paulist Press 1978,
revised edition Luramedia 1988, distributed by the poet;
Gynergy by Alla Renée Bozarth, Wisdom House 1978;
audio cassette Water Women by Alla Renée Bozarth, Wisdom House 1990,
distributed by the poet; and Stars in Your Bones: Emerging Signposts
on Our Spiritual Journeys by Alla Bozarth, Julia Barkley and Terri Hawthorne,
North Star Press of St. Cloud 1990. All rights reserved.

Inspired by “Mountain Moving Day, ” 1911, by Japanese Feminist Poet,
Yosano Akiko.