For those who’ve asked for it, here’s my poem Grateful that I wrote during Hutchmoot: Homebound.
I am grateful.
Darkness pulls at the edge of my cloak, and
I am grateful to stand
in the smoke. I am able
to laugh as I choke
under scorched skies.
Milky eyes leave streaks
through dust tracks on my cheeks, ash
rains down around me in the streets,
Father, the world is on fire.
I raise my hands higher
in the flames,
I am more than dust, and rust, and pain.
I am grateful
for the strain
of music running through the veins
of earth. For the birth
of new joy in a hurricane
of woes. For those
who raise their horns
to split the night asunder. For thorns
shoved into willing brows and the thunder
of hooves on battle plains. For those who bow
under the weight and laugh beside me.
For the dark that could not hide me,
and the dawn that always rises in the east.
For the feast to come,
that’s starting here
with table scraps of grace
and the light of shattered gold on every face.
Every trace of truth, it matters
and it breaks
into the battered body
like a song. I am wrecked,
and sore,
and long to rest.
But more, and more, and more, and best,
I am grateful.
If you’d like to hear the poem in it’s spoken-word form, you can watch it here on the Rabbit Room blog.
Shigé Clark Writing 