Brenda Hillman

The muses were distracted so they called their sister in

She flew from the east to the west to the middle

Someone had told her to bring the arrows

Someone had told her to bring libations & bolts of lightning & the charts She arrived with good cheer & wore her hair long then

She brought a sketch of the weather & the wild hearts

Thus she worked for decades among stargazers & word makers in a town with green summers & a smooth black angel

She lived among those transfixed by sorrow & desire

She never told them art is the same as not art because it is not

She never told them not to write the wildest thing in the dark

She never gave the sleepers any reason not to sleep

She never told the silver children not to play

She knew whom to phone from the maze when the word makers made trouble & when the lilies were held high

In summer the underworld pushed up seeds & her tall lover grew them as food

In autumn the pages swelled & shelves were built & word makers failed & some jokes did too

In winter the hero’s epic shield was displayed & it told all stories except hers

She could see her face in the shield though she tried to have no face

In spring she rose early to walk when each leaf caught the sun

She celebrated prizes & mourned the deaths after their songs had gone She did not cast down the lightning

She did not stamp the sad harrowing ledgers

She loved the abstract ones the happy ones the ragged & the drunk She told them it was their energy & their dream energy went on She was the rosy-fingered sister working for the dawn

from BH with love, for CB