A Prayer from the Queer Studies Section of the Bookstore
~ Tumblr user dominusdeus
With thanks to dominusdeus for her kind permission to share this poem.

At the bookstore
That I have been to three times so far,
I am standing in the religion section
Two aisles, one of eastern philosophy and
One of western doctrine
And I am in in the middle of the Red Sea
Its waters standing in towers on either side of me
Like a divine parting
Like a narrow path
And at the end of the row, intersecting with the English Standard Version and
Thich Nhat Hanh,
Is a bookshelf on Queer Studies and
A story about a woman who felt out of place in her own home
Because a voice from heaven told her to love everyone and
She took it literally and
She felt like an outsider in her own land
Probably like Mary did
Probably like David did
But this woman’s story isn’t found in the thin leaf pages of a holy book
So she wrote her own called
Trust
And Courage and
Every other name she wishes she had for herself
And here we are
I am in the wilderness looking towards the promised land of milk and honey and rainbows and equal rights
With Allah on my right and G-d on my left and Jesus laying open on the floor telling me
Pick up the damn book already
It’s not going to burn you
It’s not going to kill you
No one will look at you funny
And if they do
We are all here
Cheering you on

LGBTQ pride display at Literati Bookstore in Ann Arbor, Michigan – Photo by American Booksellers Association

The Well at Mylor
~ Penelope Shuttle

At Mylor
the water of the well

bears the armour of the light,
it hides and escapes

and stays still
under its hood of rock

amid a galore of graves
and green leaves,

spring of fresh water
beside the sea,

a find, a treasure,
a pedigree,

no idyll
but the essential source,

now retired
from its work of sole sustenance,

living among memories
of former fame,

a saint’s hand dipping in
like a taper unquenched,

coins splashing down
for reverence, not luck,

from time to time,
a self-baptism,

secret and quick,
for some

prefer their ritual
out of doors,

water understands this,
and loves the brow

fanned with its body
for reasons the water easily guesses,

for it is the one who blesses,
freely,

freely it runs
its long unceremonious

caress
through my fingers,

and on my lips
tastes ferriferous,

blood-hint at the periphery,
pell-mell mint at the heart.

The Holy Well at Mylor Cornwall

Forty-One
~ Cassandra Warren

You disappoint him. He says
this isn’t true but you know him now.
You finally sleep well next to his shape
and he often wanders into your day
and night dreams. He isn’t demanding
and you are always sorry.
Sorry that you can barely read in front of him,
sing in front of him, play your guitar
as clearly as you do when you’re alone.
In some ways, these are metaphors.
In some ways, these are not.
Maybe the perception is wrong.

You’ve been writing for a long time.
You break your lines better,
say things without saying them,
but it gets jumbled up
before it reaches the receiving point.
Sometimes in your head it gets so loud
that you have to turn off
all the lights. When his hand
slides across your stomach, when he kisses
your forehead, or touches you in public.
Never when it’s lips on your neck
or fingers lingering on the inside
of your thigh. That is different.
Something more animal.

–

A weekend away is not enough.
You call your life “mediocre” and state
that you are “wasting approximately fifty percent,”
although the actual number would probably be quite higher
if calculated correctly.

Make a list of cities again.
Pittsburgh
Portland
Providence
Philadelphia
Boston.
Add Seattle and New York for the unrealistic hell
of it. Keep a suitcase packed
under your bed at all times.
Don’t own any pets, keep any men
or buy any expensive furniture,
for these things are hard to leave behind.

–

You used to write about more interesting things.
Mostly larger messes, ones that weren’t
about you exactly, but someone
poured them over you anyway.
Headlights in trees, lakes without bottoms,
the body your mother found
in the backyard, and then
the one they never let you see.
These are better stories.
Less selfish, in a way.

Anyway, the point is, somewhere
along the way you stopped believing
that you deserved anything.
There is little left
to elaborate on.

Wisps of October
~ Elizabeth Alford

The night we made s’mores
at the dining room table—
toasting marshmallows
on the ends of pretzel sticks
over unscented tea candles,
watching bubbling balls of fire
gradually transform into
charred, crispy, gooey
ghosts of their former selves
which we ate smooshed between
graham crackers and half each
of a Hershey’s chocolate bar—
was the last night I thought
with absolute certainty
that our love
would never melt down,
reach the end of its wick,
and burn out completely.

I posted this on Patreon earlier, and realize I hadn’t managed to post it here!

Community Altar Sept 2017

This month’s community altar focuses on the idea of harvest, being September and all.
The centerpiece is a line art drawing of a sheaf of wheat, on which I wrote my wishes for us all to harvest this year: peace, abundance, health, love, kindness, joy, and equality. As I colored the art (with my trusty Stabilo pencils), I meditated on these manifesting for us all.

I had hoped to decorate the altar with my personal harvest from my yard, but the heat wave over Labor Day weekend destroyed most of my plants. (The weeds are fine, thank you.) I did manage to salvage a bit of the Spanish lavender, which you can see more clearly in this photo:

Community Altar Sept 2017 Close Up

I’ve also uploaded the line art file, if you are so inclined to do something similar for your personal altar.

Wishing you all a joyful harvest of that which feeds your soul!