Read or Listen.

My mistress keeps her careful hands,

On faces and on glass.

She measures memories out in sands,

Marks moments as they pass.

Not long ago, I lay preserved,

Felt dread at every dawn.

I thought that time was frozen too,

And life itself withdrawn.

Yet still she counts, and I had fled-

Hid even from the sun.

I veiled her face, I joined the dead,

Refused to hear her song.

It’s hard to live amongst the dead.

They whisper from the black,

‘To stay alive, don’t look ahead.

But also don’t look back.’

‘This is the best you’ll ever be.’

I’m wrapped in linen, white.

But wait. But wait. This can’t be me.

The sands were always bright.

The slab is heavy on my tomb,

I lift it all the same.

I am not dead! I cry, I kneel,

I don’t know my own name.

I need to meet myself again,

Peel back the sheets anew.

Her hands are spinning, deep within,

So I’ll keep moving too.

Written February 17, 2021

The seven verses above were the first glimpses I had of my muse, Mistress Time. She who frequents my poetry with words of advice, critique, and affirmation to this day. She first visited me soon after I escaped a nearly decade long abusive relationship. Things had gotten so bad, I deadened myself to the world in order to bear it.

But somehow, the ticking of her minute hands soon reached me, and I awoke in time to break free from the tomb. Even entering the sunlight again was blinding, terrifying. I did not even know myself, so long I had been defined by my enslavement to an abusive narcissist.

Now, I have deafened myself to the words of the dead. I keep moving. Over a year later, I have begun to know myself again, grow myself again, be kind and good again. I hope, if you have need of her, the ticking of her gentle hands will reach you too.

I think of all my common measure poems as single verse. The seven verses above, while now assembled into one ‘poem’, I still regard as seven separate poems- they could be read as singles, or reordered. Any might speak, any might not.

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Also published on instagram, @AimeeWoodWrites, February 4, 2022.