In the Blue of the Flame

I don't want
to sit around
or sing and dance
and tell stories
around a sacred fire,

I want to stand
in the blue
of the flame -
naked,
groundless,
yet alive,

tempered by
an unquenchable longing
to meet myself
in my fiery wholeness,
reclaiming the majesty
and insignificance
of what I am
and what I'm here to do,
in a world that's content
to share stories around a fire,
too terrified to burn
its fingers and toes.

Balance

and my heart
tipped over
to one side
and the other,
juggling
squiggling
careening
plunging
soaring
to new heights,
new depths,
new lengths,
new breadths;
lines becoming curves,
circles becoming spheres,
images digested,
and dissolved
beyond definition;
balance emerging then
not from staying
rooted
in the centre,
but by burning bridges
that cradled a spent self,
moving out all the while
with quivering fingertips,
to touch the seamless sky
and her cerulean affinity
to seek her own
dark, uncertain depths.