It was in a valley of sunflower
blooms when the maid, the mother and the crone
came to our door. They called you out. “Daughter”
is a word hard enough to shatter stone
so now all I have left are broken rocks.
I am fine with the rites and all we do,
but not this. First they cut off your dreadlocks,
tattooed your skull, gave you a sword, taught you
how to kill. My daughter now makes chaos
kneel and beg but was taken one spring day,
leaving nothing for my arms to hold tight
but air. I wait for you, love, so that my loss
might be found. You’ll always be my blessed, fey
child; not some blood-soaked woman, dying knight.
The words are drenched with the soul of loss and lament. Nevertheless, at the same time combines the elements of human downfall, austerity and sanctity for one’s own kind.
Regards,
Most of us live in patriarchal societies of one sort or another. In college I had friends who’d talk about if things were reversed, if we lived under a matriarchal society, there wouldn’t be war and poverty and all the other social ills that plague us. A couple of days ago I had found a photo of a crying mother during World War 2 watching her son go off to fight. I might be wrong, but it seems that almost every revolution I’ve ever heard about fails because the moment whoever the minority was who rebelled against their oppressors turn around, once they are in power, and simply do the same terrible things that got them upset in the first place. That’s where the idea came from: a reversed world where it was the father crying at home while his daughter is taken away to fight in some war. Because I know if I had a daughter I’d be standing in my doorway crying if she was taken from me.