Art is an act of Love

Silence: a love poem

Letters stilled,

Songs buried with the dead.

Violence brought about

By the fear of words, the brush, the pen…

All birthed by pain and blood.

Images of enlightened are pursued by those who want to silence….

The power of thought,

Boldly struck;

Court death, censorship, imprisonment, exile

Or quickly, negation.

Yet this is how we love

Some praise the deceased

Lorca, Neruda, Brutus, Agosin, Lorde, Tutola

Stilled words

That still liberate us all

Many, many more musicians, writers, painters;

And the very heart of humanity the poets

This is how we love, now

By braving all

For all of us.

The few tears others shed

While savoring every fierce word and image;

That are left behind or becoming

Smell numbly of the fear

Of not embracing the art, the truth

And leaving behind blindness.

To us, the artists

That shiver awake at night

Lie in terror not of death

But of not loving enough.

This is not courage at all

That imperils us,

But passion

For we must see into the darkness

And define it;

Or suffer not to love.

Some have tried to stop me too

In so many ways’

To convince sweetly or conquer with terror.

I have been shot at, men threatened to have my hands cut off.

Worse ignored like the Cassandra that I am.

I never stopped for

What I,

All of us, fear the most,

Is to stop telling

And be silent.

This is how I love

Must love

Thoughts of the beautiful, the neglected, forgotten, untold

But haunted by the terrible visions of violence;

Rendered well.

For this is how artists love…

Toni Truesdale copyright 1990

IMBOLC: Bridgit

“Woman by the Well”

by Toni Truesdale

Grottos, springs, wells and water,

Were all innate realms of  ancient female deities;

For all tribal European cultures.

Brigit of the ancient Irish evolved from the original Dana.

Christianized, she remains associated with fire and water.

Arthurian Lady of the Lake predates the mythic cycle

Wherein she reaches through time.

Mama Wata, who melds the European with the West African,

Protects woman and children;

She echoes the Medusa of Mediterranean Sea

Who was transformed by patriarchy into a fierce monster

But who came from the original Mother Earth religions

That listened to speech of snakes in sacred houses.

And in the sea, Silkie and Mesuline still hint

At the power of women and water

Giving birth to all...

Wells were used all over the world as channels to the spirit world.

And still today, many indigenous cultures

Hear the woman in the sea, by the well and in the water.

Truesdale copyright 1994

ToniTruesdale.com