so when you find a poem like this
-and you’ll know by the
chill that rises along your arms and travels
down your spine
the one that pulses truth
the one that says
this poem may one day be the
one thing that stands between you
and the siren song of the shadowlands –
when you find a poem like that
write it by hand on the prettiest paper
careful cursive, just like they taught you in grade school
fold it carefully
edges lined up with precision
make the crease lines just so.
take it out
every so often
even when everything
is perfect
and tomorrow looks like infinity
and you swear you will never
sleep alone again
but just in case
memorize the words
and the words between the words
you may need them again
quite likely, dear one, you will need them again
and again
on blue black nights at 3am
and the days when the sun has baked your bones dry and
still the rains won’t come
and when the ground is too hard for rest
but not steady enough
to rise from
when you call and call and they do not come home.
when those days come
you won’t remember right away
so deep will you be in the sweet mess of grief
but eventually you will remember
and when you do
take the poem out of your back pocket
unfold it carefully
smooth the creases and lay it flat.
brush your hair and your teeth
maybe put on some lipstick
whatever it takes to
remember your beauty and worth
then take a breath
because even though it seems impossible
that a poem could have so much power
it is quite entirely possibly that
this poem will
remind you of truth
when heart and ego are wrecked and ruined
it will sustain you
when food loses it’s lure and the air is so heavy
you stay in bed until noon.
this poem will be talisman and guide
on the journey back home to yourself.
so give it a chance
what is there to lose, anyway?
you have already lost it all, after all
you were holding so tightly and you lost, anyway
so go ahead
read it aloud
through your tears.
give it the cadence
that is the exact opposite
of the love song you don’t think
you’ll ever be able to hear again without crying
speak in in a voice that sounds nothing like the one you used to whisper her name
this is where you get your voice back
roll that poem around in your mouth
suck the letters between your teeth
blow them out like rings of smoke in winter air.
take them into your fists and throw them into the darkness
after all
there is a reason your body quivered
when you read this poem for the first time
there is a reason you listened to me
and took the time to write it out and
that you saved it for today
there is a reason you remembered to do this.
so dammit – read the poem.
put your whole being into that poem
breath and body and blood and guts and tears.
read it again
and again
let the refrain rise
until the truth of it is a light composed of syllables
until the light is a bullet proof vest made of words
until the bullet proof vest is enough to protect you from your own fury
until your fury becomes the vast heat of power
until the power lodges in your belly, red hot and burning true
and then, and only then
howl that poem at the night sky with every ounce
of fire you have ever known
call it back to you as if you own it
and then stop and breathe for a minute.
slow and steady.
and see if you don’t feel differently.

this is what it is
my bravely broken one
to let a poem save you.

The post to let a poem save you appeared first on Jeanette LeBlanc.

Let us please her.

2. Poetry is not always literal. Do not assume our poetry means what it says. Sometimes it will mean the exact opposite. Sometimes I love you means I hate you. Sometimes come here means go away. Do not twist yourself into a pretzel trying to figure out what it might mean. Let me repeat this again. Poetry is not. Always. Literal. Except when it is. You risk madness trying to figure this out.

Let it be.

3. Poets fall in love easily. Regularly. Messily. With people. With ideas. With food. With the way the light falls through your hair and crosses your cheek. With the sound of our own thoughts. Love is fodder for our art. Love is the root of it all. So much love, and not all of it for you. This is the danger of loving a poet. This is the bliss of loving a poet.

Let us love.

4. When the voices in our head start speaking we don’t talk back or look for a doctor to make them stop. We write them down. On whatever we can find. Receipts. The last letter you got from your late grandmother. Dollar bills. The entire surface of our right arm. If you happen to be bald, the top of your head is fair game in a pinch. Do NOT fall asleep while we are holding anything that can be used as a writing implement. We will write at traffic lights. During happy hour. Right in the middle of a particularly romantic moment. Our words must find a home or they will consume us.

Let us write.

5. You have never been as beautiful as you will be through our eyes. You will have never known that the hard edge of your hipbone was worthy of poetry, or the curve of your smile or the husk of your voice or the caress of your cheek against our own. But if we love you, we will turn you into a poem. You will be made immortal by the power of our words. You can count on this.

Let it happen.

6. When you start to date a poet we should read you your rights: Anything you say/do or think can and will be held against you. We will write about what an ass you were that one night, about how you drive us bonkers by singing REO Speedwagon in the shower, about the ways you have brought about betrayal. Still, if you censor yourself, we will know this too. You might as well speak your truth. It’s all poetry to us.

Let us write you into life.

7. At some point, we will get ink stains on your good sheets. Your best dress shirt. That super important report you stayed up all night finishing for your boss. This will drive you crazy. But know that we will also make love to you with ink stained hands. Finger paint typewriter font onto your skin, brand a masterpiece into the spaces between your ribs with the words flowing from our palms. Tattoo you with the imprint of our hearts. Together, we will become a living poem.

Let us get messy.

8. We will love you well, with words and nuance, with bodies and phrasing, with kisses and passion, with poems and love letters scratched on coffee shop napkins. So that no matter what happens between us, for the rest of your life, something in your soul will always be searching for the poem that we were together. This will make it very hard to be your next girlfriend.

Let us love you.

9. Poetry has a long, long memory. After our love is long gone, we will still be reading your poems. You will not be the only one whose heart this breaks. Know that we will stand , reading the words written about our love – and we will ache for you  The body will remember the way you shifted and sighed as skin met skin and those words will pay tribute to the lines that were composed while we moved through this world together. Because of this, we will never truly forget you.

Let us remember.

10. If you’re going to love a poet you should know this. Our words are our truths. Our blood hums with verse. We break easily. Our words save us. Our stanzas keep us alive. If we loved you at all, we loved you truly. And you will never leave us but live under our skin and beneath the tips of our fingers and in the ink spill on blank page.

Because poetry, like some love, is forever.

The post 10 things you should know {if you intend to love a poet} appeared first on Jeanette LeBlanc.

I know you have things to say.
Things you must say

Didn’t anyone ever tell you,
That we have to speak our truths

Our stories are where the revolution begins.

So, unlock it, poet
Let loose the words
Unconstrain your endless restraint
Seduce your muse
Release your wild
Welcome this rebellion
Usher it inside
Sit it down by the fire
And dance into the night.

You are warm blood,
hot skin, tight words
You are history
and future
and magic and make believe
You are deep and raw and real

You are an uprising
A revolution onto yourself
The scarcity is over
The rationing has ended
and there are words enough
for all of us

So go mad now, poet
let the power of the story
take you over
take you under
carry you home.

Don’t dare tell me
You are not a writer
Because I’ve heard words slip
Honeyed from your lips
I’ve seen the sonnets form behind
Your graceful eyes
I’ve felt novels spin from the spiral
Of your goddess hips

Don’t you dare
Make this other
This is in you
This is why you are here

This is your story
Your vital spark
Your ache and your tears and your breakdown
Your joy and your revelry and your bliss
Your desire, your fierce longing, your unceasing want
Your utterly unguilty pleasure.

This is the root of your commitment
The space of your deepest promise
That eternal vow
To live out loud
To speak freedom
To own the deep
Of your existence
To know it is true
And good
And worthy and whole.

So unlock it ocean poet
Release it windmill dancer
Splash it on canvas watercolor darling
Play the strings, you maker of music
Breathe it in yogi, and then breath it out.

Unleash it, you goddess of words, and melody and paint and dance and sweat.
There are a million ways to tell your story

I’m ready for every last one.

Try me

The post Unlock it, Poet {our stories are where the revolution begins} appeared first on Jeanette LeBlanc.

__________

Download Girl On Fire as a magazine style PDF – print and read it when you need a reminder of who you are and the power of your light.  Subscribe and download by clicking on the link above.
***

Listen With Me {a soundtrack for fanning the flame} on Spotify.

____________

there is a girl

she is wise
and wary of flames
but still, she knows
she will survive the fire
life scorches sometimes.
she has been a phoenix before
and every time
she burns to ashes
she knows
exactly how to rise
again.

she carries
destruction grief
carved river deep in her bones
specializes in
wrecking ball
knows how to bring
the whole thing down
surveys the broken
claims it as wholeness
and names it all good
she knows well
the holy necessity
of beginning again.

she has gone mad
for beauty
found rapture in shadows
calls poetry her religion
she seduces uncertainty
like a dominatrix
bows to no god
names herself goddess
builds alters
to the divinity
of heat and sweat and sex
and claims righteous ownership of
the body she has been given.

she once held her truth
in bone marrow,
locked deep.
but she was always
prone to fracture
learned that words flowed best
at the broken spots
she wrote splinter point novellas
told shatter stories
knit words into worlds
and worlds into heat
and heat into breath
and breath into medicine
and she learned her voice
had the power to heal.

she lives transparent now
welcomes the feel
of air on bare skin
throws arms wide
holds out her heart
and says here
take this
all of it
she figured early
that far too much energy
is invested in veiling
truth
in hiding bodies
in cloaking love
she refuses
to cultivate shame
she saves her effort
for vital things.

she knows that

love is expensive
and always worth
the price
she knows home is not
where she lives
but something
inside held
and sometimes
only found by leaving
she knows that walls
are imaginary
and that open doors
are everywhere
and that eventually
we will all
make our way
back to the sea
back to the crashing waves
back to salt water truth

she does not believe in one day
no happily ever after
or black and white
hard truths
her forever is now
she finds her rapture in the fullness
of this moment
humanity is her only dogma
kindness her communion
and church a mountain top
in the center of the desert
while the city pulses below
she speaks amen
in every holy fragment of existence.

she always knew she’d have daughters
knew she would mother them well.
she teaches them the value of their
outside voice
their no voice
their yes voice
their my entire being is a temple voice
she teaches them that their spirit
is truth
and their truth
is strength
and their strength
is vulnerability
and their vulnerability is a gift.
she knows too many girls
are broken before they
become
she has done battle in the name of rebirth
carries her scars with fierce grace
she finds beauty in the breakdown
and wholeness in the shatter
strength in the fault lines
and goodness in everything.

she is not afraid to name her gifts
knows the magic in her words
knows the spiral in her hips
she has a vital spark
at the center of her longing
she has secrets behind her eyes
and will share them
with anyone
who asks
but she only wants those
who commit
to asking.

she knows that compromise
is for vocations
and that spirit
is non-negotiable
she accepts no labels or limits
build her a box
and she will dismantle it carefully
use the pieces
to create a stage
and sing her own wild song
knows there is a power
in the melody we carry in our
bones.

She knows the lotus blooms
in mud
she knows the phoenix
goes down in flames
she knows the rapture of lust
and the escape of captivity
she knows the center of the paradox
is where the truth is found.

she is full of sky
full of starshine
full of goddess flame
bleeds words
speaks truth
welcomes it all
howls at the moon
she is a girl on fire
she is stoking the flames
she is lighting the world
she is burning to ashes

And always she is rising

And rising

And rising again.

__________________________________

Download Girl On Fire as a magazine style PDF – print and read it when you need a reminder of who you are and the power of your light.  Subscribe and download by clicking on the link above.

The post girl on fire { a poem for women ready to light the world } appeared first on Jeanette LeBlanc.