11-27-01

My heart a volcano,

love pluming out

in fireworks of lava.

Caked cool and obsidian black on the surface,

but from beneath

spurts and oozes red-orange fire—

wounds in the earths, wombs of the earth,

glowing ember gashes

that flow and cool, cool and flow.

A woman is tied to the sea,

it’s said, bound

by waves cold and pale as the eyes

of a corpse.

A’a and pahoehoe are my fiery tides,

the holy bones of Pele’s mountain.

With them I surge,

reducing all to embers

glowing like rubies.

Where my feet touch soil,

small flame-vines grow

to lick my soles clean.

Everything I touch burns

to soft grey ash

or melts, reforming

as glassy spikes

that plunge deep

into red-clay flesh

and loose another smooth flow of passion.