Calypso's Island

He formed me from Indian spices,
draped over my flesh
the finest raw silk
spun from worms, shrimp fed in the tropics.
He placed me on this enchanted island
and made me immortal to protect me from his wife.

He made me temperate as the evening star,
encased my feet in silver sandals,
and on my brow, the white cloud of swan feathers.
Not swayed by the evening breeze
I stand tall, a unfaltering candle,
bright and alluring,
shining over my lands
as I kneel to scoop sailors
out of the sea.

Below me drop echoes of crystal sound,
clear pools, the center
of my spirit, and fast waterfalls
engage in free flowing dance.
They splash up the heat as fingers unclasp,
ease, then release, their slow
sticky leaves, the centers wide open,
thread down the trails of their lifelines
with green, deep as the bottom of my dreams.

At the top of the cliffs
I release tame doves.
White feathers rise against the sun
to eclipse the moon in search of
their black eyed mates
in my paradise of one
of many. But there is only room
for one hard mand at a time
inside this aching
body of mine.

I still bear the bruise
of the man I called husband,
in an afterlife I have almost forgotten.
The bite he took out of my apple
red heart, was enough
to sustain him the rest of his days.
Again and again, I called out to him
from the chin of the cliff of the starry sea.

I tried to call him back to me
but the voices of the Sirens
had already claimed his ears,
speaking to him of darker, richer enticements,
beyond the reach of my hearing and touch.

And they mesmerized him
with their mermaid songs, took him down
deep in the undercurrents of his own tangled longing.
Relentless as I was in my pursuit of him
and seasoned as his ears were
to my conchal chant
I could not keep our love alive.

I am surrounded by water
on all sides, the rocks rise
around me like a fortress
to hold my heart, full, ripe
and ready as a summer plum.
My pools speak of wisdom,
and knowledge, the hot springs
of desire, the Odysseus kiss
as the next man comes
in the wake of the last ship
that set out to sea.
His hair smells of seaweed,
his arms are long oars, bronzed from the sun
I braid his hair with wildflowers,
sift it through my fingers,
brand his body with my own love tattoos.

He is safe in my harbour
as long as he wants to remain here.
With the sea sound and word waves
I rock him gently in the warm cradle
between my thighs. The Aeolus winds
have drifted us together
here on my island of sweet enchantment
and the Sirens sing from their caves by the sea.
Strong is the longing,
the union of the heart, the flesh, and the spirit
and the sweet, aching mystery.

-- Genine Hanns