The Ashes Of My Heart Poem by Lisa Alva

The ashes of my heart...

…would be a low and floating note struck on the thrum of the whale’s heart…
Floating, gliding low, low, depths of indigo floating about
Shadows of light, ghosts slipping over a floor of sand, so deep.
I write my note on the placid face of the water, under the water, the sound is lost –
only the exhalation remains…
gas and light, blue oblong bubbles exhaled from the mammoth breast.

…would be the high and gliding breath of wind aloft above the airy plain…
The riffling of breeze across the tips and ends of wings dipped in ink
High plaintive note rising from faraway peaks of whitecapped crags,
an outline only along the sky, grey mongol sky…
I write my note along the drifts of wind,
along the wind,
the letters slip away leaving a silent silhouette stretching towards the sun,
from a cloud, from an aerie,
the long shapes and trails turning and curling… a sigh.

Juno, still angry about Achilles, still sends Iris to burn the fleet, no going home now.

Galahad, like Joseph, still innocent, still sends his prayer to the sky, hands bound.

I write my notes on papyrus strips and dropp them, petals, into a pond of brine…
I watch them float a moment, watch the subtle flesh loosen between the strands …
the skeleton is left at last, it sinks so slowly,
the lone dissolving note of my concerto fading into a whitewashed distant sky.

Siddhartha, still ascetic, still strong, keeps his faith, keeps his back to the world.

Pandora, still curious, still troublesome, still looks for the place to prod Prometheus.

…would be the soft and silent mote of snow locked at rest inside the shelf of ice adrift…
Landscape monochrome, apart from night, apart from day,
only knowing eternity and peace and potential,
little atom of power gathering gathering gathering momentum towards some moment, some momentous motion,
some faraway reconciliation of fate and past…
I write my note on the face of one flake, one lovely lonely delicate creation,
the tendrils extending, multiplying, reaching
to the edge of the sea.

Sappho, still yearning, still waits for Catullus’ revision of reality, revisioning, re-visions.

She writes her dreamy songs on the silk of time, I wind myself in
her mystery…
your strength,
my garden,
my fiction,
your smile.
I smile.