I am the dryad child
bloody knees and blackberries,
I am the dryad child that no one sees.
The Gatekeeper keeps his eye by me,
yet never looks directly.
I wonder;
‘Is he afraid to see the shine of tears lamplit
Shadows cast in the hollow chest of the child that cries?’
Is that why
the Gatekeeper keeps me alone, out in the wild?
Twisting round his great clattering hoop of keys,
the jangle of which above he pretends he cannot hear me
as I am mesmerized by
the shiny ring of keys that keep me locked me out of his city.
‘I am dying! I am dying!’ I cry.
The Gatekeeper looks me over and says;
‘By the corner of my eye you look a healthy child.
Go find your comfort in the wild.’
‘I am hungry and I am cold!’
‘Your belly is soft and you have nought gooseflesh but on your elbows’
‘I am lonesome and the wolves are bold…’
‘If you want a nest go ask the crows!’
‘Gatekeeper please, see me! See me!’
‘I’ve seen your sort a thousandfold,
you beg relentless for what you already stole.’
‘And what is that? I have nought at all!’
His eye flickered by my jaw, across my hair line,
while his finger thrust at me and then to the sky.
‘You took my vision, my way in the dark.
You pillaged the heavens and stole their spark.
You stole my heart and raked it on coals.
Strange empty ravenous child,
you took my love and devoured it whole.’
‘Gatekeeper when?
When did I beg and capture all that you say that I stole?’
‘The day you scrambled out from under a rose,
placed cool lips on my cheek and chased after the crows.
The day the ravens burst forth from the shadows
heaved up their hoods and plucked off your nose.
The day you wandered, skipped lighter than light down that stoney old road.
Said ‘Never to return!’ to me and this citadel.
Now I shall stay here forever and guard this threshold.
How dare you return bearing nothing but woes?
I have held light here forever while the night soaked my bones.
Go feed the ravens while I chase the crows.’
‘Gatekeeper I am sorry, I did not know…’
‘You keep your stride child on the path that you chose.
You will not be welcomed here until you are grown.
Even then who would have you?
You savage so ravenous for a home.
If any man let you, you’d build a house from his bones.’
‘Gatekeeper I’ll leave now. I’ll follow the road. I’m sorry to keep you , I was caught by your glow.’
‘Do what you do best child, pick up sticks and go.
There’s no place for you here, leave me alone.’
I child wandered singing soft hymns to soothe deep desperate sobs.
I child hopped over puddles and scoured the frogs.
‘Who among you knows me by name?’
But the frogfolk just puffed back to me a vacant gaze
cockled their echoes and so I wandered again.
I child walked among wolves,
yet as they ran I could not keep pace.
In their eyes I saw mine framed by the fur of their face.
I cried their cry, yet they scorned my laughter.
So I set to the road again and wandered thereafter.
Among horses I shivered and settled my fears.
They taught me to listen, they lent me their ears.
Next I met bears, digging up roots.
I shared with them blackberries and nibbled on shoots.
Their great paws on my shoulders
they showed me the sky;
‘at the tail of the sky bear is where your heart lies’
I asked for lessons in making a cave,
yet received no answer,
instead they spoke of surrender
and what it takes to be brave.
I asked them if I might winter in their dreaming dens
but they just thrust their snouts to the sky
and so I wandered again.
At the top of a mountain a woman stood wise.
The crags caught my rags, the thorns tore my thighs.
I crawled and I climbed, slid back through the mud.
The woman faced west and kept up her hood.
‘Are you coming or not?’
She spoke like the fox,
as I dragged my bruised body over the rocks.
‘I am here, I have found you! Grandmother mine!’
And as she turned to face me I found she had died.
Her face was a skull, yet her hands were fleshed
with porcelain skin.
Her embrace was a deep and dark
as the charcoal steaming mugwort ether
as the long night sets in.
I asked could she see me,
she spoke clear and light;
‘I see a woman, I see no dryad child.’
She gifted me remedies, medicines of flower and vine,
she gifted me melodies what untangled the briar.
She spoke through the river,
she spoke through the rain
she wrapped me in feverfew
clutched me like pursulane.
She spoke through the seasons,
the shift of the wind
She sang out a storm and
burst forth a thunderbolt
with the tilt of her chin.
Her cloak she spread on me without losing her own,
and the cloak sank within me to sinew my bones.
She spoke soft and gently and named me Catharsis.
She showed me the north star and called it Polaris.
She told me to follow, to see where it goes.
She told me my compass was at the end of my nose.
So I soared down from the mountain, aloft by my cloak.
I sang up a river and sang cross a moate.
I marched on the marshes,
and was hurried by does,
‘I am Catharsis and I shall have my nose!’
I walked to citadel’s great granite walls
I came to the gates again, I stood proud and tall
I called to the Gatekeeper and asked him his name.
This time
he looked in my eyes,
and I saw his shame.
Sionnachaí 