Here is the latest installment of Poet’s Corner, presented by the Edmonds-based EPIC Poetry Group.

Transcendence

We walk the beaches
in light and rain,
beckoning the tide to
wash away our pain,
releasing our grief
to revelation and self-discovery.

Ahead of us in the sand,
among seaweed and
driftwood, lay the
remains of decayed sea life,
awaiting an epiphany –
the possibility of
creating new vision
for our lives
from broken shells,
shards of glass and
remnants of our shattered dreams.

Donna M. Rudiger

~ ~ ~

Pandemic Dancer

“In a dark time, the eye begins to see…” Theodore Rothke

Climb out of the well of sorrow and melancholy,
leave the valley of the shadow of death.
Reach for burning stars, shimmering rainbows,
the glow of Pleiades and Orion.

Grasp the high places of earth with hind’s feet,
stretch from bended knees for pennies from heaven
placed as mileposts on your journey.
Leap, glide and twirl through your days.
Pirouette across the spaces of the universe.
Dance away your fear, despair and insecurity.

You are a dancer on the stage of life,
every step an expression of surrender.
Your body expresses what your voice cannot articulate,
energy flows free of encumbrance,
rivers of forgiveness surge in your soul and spirit.

A lifetime of pilgrimage, still you seek wholeness,
the fruitfulness of unquenchable hope
with a determination resistant to abbreviation.
Pick up your sword and dance before your Creator,
whose anointing rests upon you forever.

You are a reflection of beauty and light,
the indwelling capacity for divinity’s delight –
the pure life-giving force
transforming your mourning to metamorphosis.

Donna M. Rudiger

~ ~ ~ ~

Hieroglyphics

Mused from When the Body Says No, by Dr. Gabor Mate’

My body is a foreign country –
void of maps or boundaries,
unrecognizable by alien life forms,
disguised by clandestine scars, in a
constant state of mutation and restoration,
facilitating the willful forgetting of the past.

My body is a cuneiform tablet –
pressed, imprinted, scaled with hieroglyphics,
radiant with epiphanies hidden
in clay chambers of my flesh;
wounds are historical landmarks
on the storyboard of my life.

My body is a sacred temple –
the holy ground of sovereign territory,
a Cathedral where Angels and Ancestors
nested their ancient wisdom in the
sacred geometry and spiritual DNA of my soul.

My body is a reservoir of grief –
a half-remembered existence championing
maturation to exiled prophet and teacher.
A melting pot, fire pit, cauldron of emotion,
driven to the roots of my lost faith –
the catch basin of glory and divine healing;
the soul ruptured, cocoon of the mind split,
inspiration embracing phoenix flight.

My body is a hand-dug well of peace –
a cavern of joy…praise…intuition,
radiating light from a restored spirit;
inscribed with mysticism, carrying the
supernatural mantle of my first Mother Eve,
the resting place of the sacred feminine.

Donna M. Rudiger

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Donna began writing poetry and prose during her adolescent years growing up southeastern Pennsylvania. An active participant of several writing groups in the Puget Sound area, she’s an award-winning EPIC poet, a member of the Academy of American Poets and teaches poetry workshops. Her work has been published in Soundings from the Salish Sea in 2018, the Skagit River Anthology in 2021 and 2022, and previous issues of the My Edmonds News Poetry Corner. She was a contributing poet for the 2022 Day of Remembrance for Japanese Americans held at Cascadia Art Museum in Edmonds. She’s a retired technical writer and enjoys filming the wildlife near her home in the Cascade foothills of Arlington. You may contact her at dmrudigerauthor@gmail.com.