Old poems and older poems. The art in here is far more recent - all illustration tiles were made between April 20, 2024 and May 12, 2024.
Some of these poems were published in a chapbook, Eleusinian Mysteries, in 1995, under the pen name Sarah Maddo...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
"I went to the Garden of Love... And I saw that it was filled with graves... And Priests in black gowns were making their rounds, And binding with briars my joys and desires." - William Blake
I made a journey by ferry to the Chapel of Love; and entered, naked, hair flowing like Godiva, holding a bouquet of lilies in my hand of making and destroying; garlands of thorned roses were my only shields. I did not go on hands and knees, though custom and past passion plays demanded it; I walked, brazen and curious, braving the sharp stained glass with my eyes. And I was pierced for it. The knight with his lance rode me and claimed me as his palfrey; his squires anointed my flesh with streaks of stained glass until I was no more than a figure of glass in a medieval window. Such is the penance for pride when one stands before the altar of sacrificing. Yet I walked on, eyes daring, feet striding, flowers dangling like broken manacles, until I stood before my lord and master and proclaimed with one sharp vorcel cry my single vowel. "I am I," I cried, crying "I" - until with a shriek, the walls fell down in so much stone and shattered glass.
