I was the old woman of stone and water.
Ready rocks becoming sand,
Slipping over time.
As I spiralled in I stepped out into the tide,
turning, back through the ages.
I spiralled in and became She at the centre.
At the Centre of all things,
watching the tide come in,
battered by storms,
I sat there for a million years,
An age,
A lifetime.
The white spirals became waves,
My blood drawn fast
and deep
down into the stone and earth,
The jagged hard rocks.
No gentle earth here,
these rocks want blood,
They cut deep.
There are no gentle tides,
these waves will dash you,
the storm is hard and wild.
There is only this:
The bare bones of the earth,
carved out by water.
There is only this:
A siege.
A battle between elements.
I will wear you down.
I will stand in your way.
It is into me you must flow.
I will form you.
I will hold you.
One to the other.
It is of wills.
They bare their teeth,
Like dogs against one another.
And yet it is as inextricable as an atom.
There is no space between.
Here,
at the beginning of me,
there is no sweetness,
no give.
There are bare and harsh truths.
Speak plain.
Be clear.
There is no human error.
Only this:
Say what you want or find yourself having what you don't.
I sat there for a million years.
I was a rock,
it was hard and uncomfortable.
The sea won in the end.
It washed me down to sand.
She has her way.
Primal, primal, primal,
and older than the dust of my bones.
I am that.
I walk out an old woman.
Crumpled and folded,
straightening up as I walk
back to the present time
unsure
and unsteady
It was liquid upon which I stepped.
Just a glimpse of myself at the centre.
