Studying Myths and Symbols of Pagan Europe by Barbara Daniels
All over this blue earth, life calls
to life, dog to man, girl to an arum lily.
Here, dear (insert your name),
we have soup on the stove, steadily
simmering but likely to fail again,
blown-out lentils, too much sea salt.
I open a book, examine a myth
of survival, Celtic spirals, new
moons. Blood soaks the stories—
dancing warriors, severed heads.
I taste a dollop of blueberry honey.
Blueberry season lasts five weeks.
Honey preserves its sweet residue.
A bird sings so loudly
it seems to be on the mantle,
beak open, calling. Why
do I live so far from a church
that I can’t hear the bells?
Barbara Daniels’s Talk to the Lioness was published by Casa de Cinco Hermanas Press in 2020. Her poetry has appeared in Lake Effect, Cleaver, Faultline, Small Orange, Meridian, and elsewhere. Barbara Daniels received a 2020 fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts.