Lilith
(Published in Metaphor, 2019)
I don’t remember much of anything about that day, not even the season, the weather, what I’d done...it was all the same at that point, I guess. I do remember my dog barking a lot that night.
Then there were droning voices on television, soon transmuting into dingy dreams, and then a dark, hidden hand. It was your hand. I could not see it, but I could feel it. Someone had turned the television off as I slept heavily under a haze of Jameson and unwarranted trust. You didn’t even have the humility to drug me first.
Streetlight slumped through flimsy blinds, giving the room the pittance of light needed to cast shadows and see the unforgiving glint in your eye. It must be another dream, because you aren’t the kind that does that sort of thing...the shifty trickster who slithers in the dark, always ensnaring themselves in their own deceptions. You can never possess that which you steal. I thought you’d know that. Then again, I thought I knew you.
“Thank God it’s over.” But no. There is an underbelly of the world that can’t be unseen. I’ve gone to my room, and you’re under my bed, waiting, waiting, waiting, shaking the bed frame. Sometimes your shadow crawls into my mouth and rests in the pit of my stomach. I can’t get the taste out as much as I
spit,
spit,
SPIT.
Everyone you know says we asked you to come to our doors, whiskey on your breath, gun in your hand….because everyone knows a woman in a short skirt is more powerful than any firearm. You must be every bad girls dream, and there are no angels anymore, right? We must all have it coming, short skirt, one piece, hijab, or hair in bows.
You’ve always feared it, haven’t you? You created new weapons, fought wars, conquered kingdoms, and built new ones to suppress it. You erected cathedrals, written scripture, disembodied philosophies and boundless ritual to deny it. You formulated volumes of laws and codes to stifle it. You said all was for our protection, then bound and burned our bodies to silence it. Nothing is more powerful than the ability to bring forth life; nothing more powerful than the mother of men. So you deny and shame us; you turn this wheel of suffering, a wheel that has been turning since the scorning of Lilith. And now, here I stand before you, the reincarnation of Lilith. Here I stand before you as Venus, Oshun, Pavarti, Ishtar and Shakti; as Isis, Tara, Freia, Gaia, and Judith. You have tried every tactic to subvert me, yet I am reborn again and again, the nourishment that fills your bottomless cup. I await the day you grow a backbone and finally look me in the eyes.
This is me warning you: there is no more hiding beneath night’s shadow, for I am the sun that rises to wake you from your graceless slumber. If you have lived in love, we will stand side by side. If you have wronged me, know that the hands of justice
tick,
tick,
away.
It is only a matter of time.
Then there were droning voices on television, soon transmuting into dingy dreams, and then a dark, hidden hand. It was your hand. I could not see it, but I could feel it. Someone had turned the television off as I slept heavily under a haze of Jameson and unwarranted trust. You didn’t even have the humility to drug me first.
Streetlight slumped through flimsy blinds, giving the room the pittance of light needed to cast shadows and see the unforgiving glint in your eye. It must be another dream, because you aren’t the kind that does that sort of thing...the shifty trickster who slithers in the dark, always ensnaring themselves in their own deceptions. You can never possess that which you steal. I thought you’d know that. Then again, I thought I knew you.
“Thank God it’s over.” But no. There is an underbelly of the world that can’t be unseen. I’ve gone to my room, and you’re under my bed, waiting, waiting, waiting, shaking the bed frame. Sometimes your shadow crawls into my mouth and rests in the pit of my stomach. I can’t get the taste out as much as I
spit,
spit,
SPIT.
Everyone you know says we asked you to come to our doors, whiskey on your breath, gun in your hand….because everyone knows a woman in a short skirt is more powerful than any firearm. You must be every bad girls dream, and there are no angels anymore, right? We must all have it coming, short skirt, one piece, hijab, or hair in bows.
You’ve always feared it, haven’t you? You created new weapons, fought wars, conquered kingdoms, and built new ones to suppress it. You erected cathedrals, written scripture, disembodied philosophies and boundless ritual to deny it. You formulated volumes of laws and codes to stifle it. You said all was for our protection, then bound and burned our bodies to silence it. Nothing is more powerful than the ability to bring forth life; nothing more powerful than the mother of men. So you deny and shame us; you turn this wheel of suffering, a wheel that has been turning since the scorning of Lilith. And now, here I stand before you, the reincarnation of Lilith. Here I stand before you as Venus, Oshun, Pavarti, Ishtar and Shakti; as Isis, Tara, Freia, Gaia, and Judith. You have tried every tactic to subvert me, yet I am reborn again and again, the nourishment that fills your bottomless cup. I await the day you grow a backbone and finally look me in the eyes.
This is me warning you: there is no more hiding beneath night’s shadow, for I am the sun that rises to wake you from your graceless slumber. If you have lived in love, we will stand side by side. If you have wronged me, know that the hands of justice
tick,
tick,
away.
It is only a matter of time.
