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Black Madonna
She is the black madonna
Holding out
Among the ruins
Her face reflected in
The mirrored fragments.
Moments ago
A lifetime
Like clockwork
Tidework
The moon pulling
At the waters of her
Ruptured womb,
She lived in a graceful
Universe.
Now fragments of cut coloured
Glass once depicting saints,
Heroic deeds, martyrs
Bearing splintered wood
Upon their shoulders,
Are scattered at her feet.
Her tiny feet are tied to stakes,
Wood is gathered,
Pieces of household furniture
Lugged out into the square,
The parking lot,
The flat expanse of asphalt
Of a mini-mall.
She is tied with others.
The stench of siphoned gasoline
From abandoned auto wrecks or
Dug up dirt
Soaked with oil
From reclamation centres.
She's set ablaze
And all of them are
Lit up like candles.
Madonna stands still
Now in thin filaments of
Skin for robes,
A black butterfly
Holding the picture of the past
In the open air
Of a lost shrine.
There is something daunting
In the stillness
When everything is gone
When life mutters only
In quiet corners
Afraid.
Perhaps the muttering could be the wind
That rips incessantly
Scattering sane thought
Like hollow cake cans and
Candy wrappers scuttling
Across pavement.
Madonna is the mother of the moment
A lost womb
With lost litters
Of crawling creatures
That in darkness
Lie in terror
Voiceless as she is.
The tools and skills
Are gone
That carved the altar
Around her,
The lost light slanting
Across the grain of oak
And mahogany.
She is the black madonna
Holding out
Among the ruins.
Copyright July 2000 David Fraser
David Fraser lives in Nanoose Bay, on Vancouver Island. He is the founder and editor of Ascent Aspirations Magazine, www.ascentaspirations.ca, since 1997. His poetry and short fiction have appeared in over 40 journals including Three Candles, Regina Weese, Ardent, Quills and Ygdrasil. He has previously published a collection of poetry, Going to the Well (2004), a collection of short fiction, The Dark Side of the Billboard (2006) and edited and published Ascent Aspirations Magazine since is founding in 1997.
Ascent Aspirations Publishing
David Fraser has a BA in English from University of Toronto, and a M.Ed. in adult education from OISE. In Ontario he taught English, Creative Writing,Writer’s Craft among other subjects at the secondary school level for 30 years. He was the ski school director for High Park Snow School, as part of a traveling ski club for 8 years. Currently he is a full time writer who also teaches skiing at Mt. Washington in the winter.
David likes to balance his life among a variety of activities in the areas of writing, education and sports such as alpine skiing, windsurfing, tennis, golf, cycling, and hiking. In addition he likes to garden, listen to the blues, and search for his way through Taoism. He has built a water garden sanctuary behind his home where he lives among the inspirational flora and fauna of the British Columbia West Coast.
“The writing of poetry for the poet is not a choice; it is like breathing, like a heart beating; the process must go on.” – David P. Fraser
Email: David Fraser
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