She Resonates
A Poem
Before unbearable pain, I kneel and surrender
Nothing to be done, no amount of sunlight will wash away
This darkest of rains, the wet earth beneath my feet gives in
And I sink further, covered toes, shackled ankles,
Knee-deep into my own misery.
The senses start to fail me, a heavy fog opens its wings
Before my eyes, flaps and scratches my sight;
Two violent crows fighting and biting
Pieces of each other off.
The soil seems textureless, I cannot distinguish
Stones from worms, seeds from thorns.
My hands open in wounds no pain can reach
Because pain is commonplace.
Everything hurts so nothing else can.
I pretend the pockets in my skin are holes
In a crop. Perhaps something will grow from this.
No one can outlive its seeds, but someone,
One day, might pick up the fruits.
In its violence, the scenery is still and silent.
The vibration is raw, wild, the sounds of dying.
You cannot believe there’s anything left to hear
But the pounding of your heart
The way your migraine can sound like rusty engines
Forcing metal against each other in your ears.
Death is loud on the inside.
But…she resonates.
The chaos stands still, the ravens stop pecking my flesh,
The earth stops engulfing me, the waist partially consumed,
Tight yet still alive. Still breathing.
She resonates.
It’s not a voice, it’s a commandment.
As if Aoede herself had risen, instructing nature
What to do, and it had to obey, to allow control
Because her power is more natural than any law
Or instinct.
Her sound is purer than the water above me
And more violent than the hungry earth devouring me.
I could in fact be dead because she sounds much better
Than anything one could have ever heard alive.
I cannot recall anything else. I look back and
The pain is tainted by a siren’s call, delightful
As drowning without knowing breathing even exists,
Just allowing the water to surround you into rebirth.
She resonates inside me.
There is something familiar in the sound, she helps me navigate
My way out.
I’m suddenly aware of the pain in specific places,
So parts of me are not hurting anymore and I can finally
Distinguish hurt from healing.
Her voice awakened the dark goddesses
That push me out of their underworld because
I´m not the right guest and I´m not on the right time.
Thanatos contracts me out like a delayed baby
Pushed into the arms of gentleness.
She breathes life into me with her high notes,
My heart relearns how to beat with the cadence
Of her deep voice.
Her hands place pomegranate seeds on my tongue
And I come back from the dead, I cross the veil again.
A mortal favoured by the divine, I have nothing better to offer
Than to exist, so I offer this: existence. Endurance.
Devout to whatever it means to be alive,
Guarding the pearly-white gates of life, defending,
Even though doubting,
That it must not be that bad.
Not while she resonates…
© 2021, Giulia de Gregorio Listo. All Rights Reserved.
This is a homage to Amy Lee, which through her voice, music and lyrics have saved me countless times.
This and many new poems will be in my upcoming book “Where the Bees Come to Die”, arriving Q1 2022. Fill this form to be notified once it comes out ;)
