Desert River Goddess

“I am wild and succulent, joyous and free.

I flow with the desert rivers and bring forth the springs.
I am the divine presence in the hollow canyons.
My dance brings life into the dry, empty spaces of sand and stone.
I am midwife to coyote and rattlesnake.

I flower the cacti in Springtime and ripen the Summer corn.
I beckon Autumn storms into being and cause flash floods to rage,
tumbling boulders and uprooting trees.
In Winter I blanket the resting earth in snow.

At daybreak and again at dusk, the sun follows me over the horizon.
Each night I place the moon in the heavens
and scatter stars across the velvet sky.”

- Melinda Schwakhofer © 2002

Desert River Goddess

Mermaid

Enticed by her siren song

I walk to the edge of the sea.

She flirts and flounces,

her spumèd ruffles tickle my toes.

Beckoning me,

drawing me in,

gently tugging and loosening my ties to the land.

Wrapping me in her tourmaline gown, shot with sun-diamonds,

twining my ankles with sea-green grass.

I am buoyant and succumb to her rhythm.

Gently twirling with just one toe in the shifting sands

I am held in her liquid embrace.

- Melinda Schwakhofer © 2007

Solstice Dawn

Deep within the longest night . . . . . . .

I wait.

Blindly weaving my dark and desolate imaginings

from the shreds of my dreams.

Working a golden thread of hope

into the weft of my despair.

Slowly, imperceptibly,

dawn returns.

Glimmering first in the depths of my soul,

then limning the distant hills.

What is this strange and beautiful light?

Radiant and luminous.

- Melinda Schwakhofer © 2007