The fire that flares up again after long smoldering years

elusive but still a reality only if trust how lovely

life can be in the everydayness women at

fifty learn to let doors close but also

open new that appear always there in rooms

we’ve not come back to so much as

seen anew or

built from the ruins of walls torn down.

In the mirror I re-identify the yin I have held since

______________

though life had me hold tight to my yan.

I know beauty like the palm of my hand no like

the shape of my brow that I glance at so often in passing with its missing spot there at center as my mother pointed out in the rearview mirror.

Beauty which is really truth is the undressing I

see anymore only.

I know this like I know my mind. No. My hands.

At work in the paint that is light once again. Life builds walls and doors and I walk

through. Full of what the search

has done to my spirit smiling

thank God I can feel around the studs and see my soul is still yet

pioneering.

I feel as if I have become too small for the love that’s sized for me.

It is hidden and quiet and for so long I have sought for it in the loud, raucous

ravenous.

The pollen falls from the anther dusting the stigma of my soul now still yet

the only organ alive alive alive ho.

What now do I have to offer?