Shadow Work

we warp the looms alone     they say     don’t they   what hurts you

blesses you           we wonder       what if all the weavers of the world

are sad   does it go into    the fabric      you haven’t     forgotten    that

if all the weavers are sad          the fabric     is a story of joy through

sadness   that inside the little fibers    is a fixing          we say  to fix something

is to hold it still           but also to mend it      so we can keep it longer

and every time you hold the thing          every time you mend the thing

you show it what you think of it            you show it that you love it

or you need it    or both     there are      many things we remember

without remembering       like bees triangulating     their flight path

with the sun     then sharing what they’ve found         through dance

just like that    we replicate     for each other    how to make a way through

this awful world     awful    as in    to be totally  terrified and totally moved

there is something in the word            that we know      to be true

like how awe steals the breath     or how you felt it rise in you

and you did not forget    but wove it    into those beasts   that you carry

just think woman every    time you heal   yourself   you heal the woman

who comes after you and     you heal    the frayed      but holding line of

women who  came before   just  like a shadow stitch   sewed to show through