Mantis in the Desert
Photograph by Alexander Gerst
By Lilia Skelhorn
He’s come a long way,
to be there on your shoulder.
This has taught you that
miracles live,
and that messengers come when needed.
Ravens
Wind
A big moon that pretended to be daylight.
He was the tallest man in the bar,
after three days of not eating.
Forty drums all saying something different,
together.
Is this your first time?
Belonging?
Soon you’ll go home—
back to where it snows,
changed.
You have an accent now,
you fall in love soon.
For me it was a lady bug on my skirt—
wish fulfilled.
I’m going somewhere,
soon.
If not first—
I’ll go where your feet were,
and I’ll be someone’s miracle.
***
In the vision:
I’m cutting horseradish and frying mustard,
with consideration for the venison
who we held in our arms on the road the day before.
There’s paint on my forearms still,
I crane my neck,
he’s doubled through the glass window.
There are four of him— all different colours,
sitting on a stump,
brow furrowed,
completely a part of the frizzled growth that’s crowned him.
Bending over something of his making,
knifing a piece of wood, meditating,
oblivious to my smile.
I was the wall next,
and in the kitchen I saw a solid, nourished being.
All the corners loved her,
then I was the land,
and I loved,
then I was the food
and I loved.
Then I was the whittler, loved,
and loving.
At dusk, the screen door creaked,
he brought in a small wooden doll.
I held it to my heart
and we ate.
***
Spirit.
Now I fly.
Quickly to the green earth’s end.
And before last;
To clay rock,
it's decided now.
Where there are matted cats—
where we will check our boots for scorpions each morning.
Then we’ll learn the earthen hardness of life
Into and out of the arms of routine,
of time, of bustle and begging.
An outsider soon
Quiet when I come back,
but very full.
We rock in arms at the station
contemplating forever
and what we’ll all choose.
Tearful kisses
My feet lift
Lilia skelhorn grew up in the Great Lake regions of Ontario with a deep sense of belonging and solidarity to the natural world, and in the different landscapes of the West Coast, she deepened these senses. She is a visual artist and creatrix of many sorts, working hard on building her artistic career under her emerging umbrella company Mouth Media. Her main source of inspiration is the love and tenderness that can form between things of vast differences, and when she witnesses moments of such love occur, its her first instinct to document them through her writings and art.
