Le Culte du Moi

The Storm
Alessandra Wollner

Because the sky is violet I know
   Something sinister slinks towards me,
           ready to disturb the peace.
           The sky’s slung low and uberous.
                     The trees here whisper threats.
Like a silent starting gun has sounded,
dead leaves whip into a twister
                           my curls all writhe to life--Medusa’s snakes
vicious as they bite my cheeks and blur my vision.
               The wind picks up,
           the rain drops down
in sharp little bullets that
   scream with each new hit
               “wake up, Wake up, WAKE UP!”
               All the ruckus does it. It wakes
                          the slumbering fury in my chest,
                                the one I forced unconscious for so long
                                 with a host of reckless diversions.
                           I poured vodka down my throat,
                       danced and sweated,
                   howled with vicious laughter,
               threw my weight around,
           and made sure to get bruises
       in noticeable places.
   It worked.
The rough beast fell. Dead for the moment, no longer my problem.
       But when this downpour came, it soaked me in vehement reality.
           I shivered this demon out of her torpor,
                       a wet salvation.
                        She is Diana with her arrow,
                           Athena, whose wisdom is a weapon,
                                        Unruly, rebellious, riotous force,
                                    she is dangerous and defiant.
                                     She has proven that she cannot be
              contained, constrained,
                    or coerced to submission.
                    The things she sees make her bitch blood boil.
                   Welcome, rage, you cherished guest,
            to a world of sleeping furies
waiting to be woken.