Free verse in homage to the spirituality of the swamp

Sepulcher of the Lotus

Photo by Dionne Charlet — water flower, Bayou Cane, Louisiana.

for Harriet and Orisia

She mantles
the rosary of her lore
across the flooded forest
with a brush dipped
and dripping.

Biding the pigments,
she centers the priory
of her canvas
beneath fronds of marsh
where the brackish yields
to kneeling cypress
stumped in congregation
before the rebirth of the lotus.

Moon-blown nymphal fingers,
each a welded swan in mourning,
filigree strokes of swamp
from rhizome and silt,
filtering the apex
gar and moccasin
to crown the dome of stomata
within the eddies of the mist.

Ringlet afloat, fragrant, perfection,
her tepals echo tongues of the East
where tolerance of choice
rises from the murk
to hatch from a clutch,
find solace in hisses,
and seek every soul in bloom.