Good Ground

Good Ground

by Jessica Doble

My tasks each yeargoddess of springThe ground of the bloodiest battlesGettysburg Recovery needs coaxingThe white and purple wildflowersThistles that grow five feetThe buried acorns to seedlings I place my palm on groundCrackling dead grassThe thawing groundSeeped blood of men Last two seasons,I find embittered cold from Father-ZeusTastes of chalk on the back of my throatI dirty my thigh with brown decay Place remembers relivesThe humans reenactThe gods rememberThe shades entombed The opening of the groundRitual and battlement parkHappens at sunriseWe waken I raise my armsMimic the sun’s pathMother behind meThese tasks alone we perform in alignment Dryads emerge from shadowed trunksThe Auloniades from their grounded bedchambersThe scarred Hamadryads, life tree-tiedThese are the nymphs of the land—eyes of knotted bones We call upon mother earthGaia of us—we are youTo heal from the frozen seasonand deaths of thousands We call upon Gaiafor fertility and victoryin the compassed groundridged to little and round topped hills-beat our breasts We call upon the heartsof pilgrims, the salt tearsthe rooted connectionand the care of history We wrest lifefrom the deadWe scream Ouranossky holds life giving light Aether We scream GaiaEarth food giving lifeWe scream Poseidonin thirst we cannot be quenched It pulls more from meMy domain and power more violentThe spring volatilefrom thousands of years I grasp, it positioned upon the miled groundRetread for hundreds of yearsI wield power and body to dirtDelicate fingers alight the veins of memory, desire, death, and hunger We build a great bonfireLight to light of the rising sunWe greet DawnSoak our faces in her caress The birth of springIn GettysburgMother kisses my parched foreheadHer wheat hair entangling mine Dryads dance flickering and strengtheningIn the coming dayNaked limbs and torsos their treesThe waters from beneath themStealing the airPressing the sunlight betweenTheir hands their thighsEach blink of the eye       The earth my back      Light piercing lids      Shrunk husk          I’m unmoving Soon the humans will come, marvel at Gettysburg                Cry from bent backs      We used to pound our breasts in mourning      Instead these humans take pictures      Listen to Gettysburg’s storytellers                They don’t remember the gods      Clasp hands between them or in front of their chests                         Sometimes I star my body and wait for them                         To walk the grassed plains                         Reverberating footsteps echo                         Hades picks up my body                         Grasping hands behind knees and back                         To Plum Run to be soothed by the Naiads                         He wades to the deepest part of the river                         And the Naiads press me                         Cool water seeping to tissue                         A tide upon bone                Goddess of spring

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Featured in our October 2021 issue, "Ritual"