Lovers Lament

She longs to be held,
my Mary Magdalene, in a lovers embrace.
Spooned & cocooned
Jesus, giving his life
for her.

His arms, extend
holding on giving in
sinking further; a fusion
of flesh & bone,
a comfort hold & home.

I know he too saw
the black curtain fall
& from that moment
they were lost. Lost
& found.

Karma settles scores
resets the All, divine demands
an eternal sacrifice
& Mary yearns for desire
to make it all worthwhile.

A light.

Recognition, foretells
omens coming in three’s,
a wiccan rede; magic, morality
& the afterlife,
a promise from Eden.

She wails. Mary
kisses the soul of destiny,
trusting something bigger
than her parts & let’s go
giving in to fates fury.

A slow grind
losing lust’s sake
to find love & the third eye
delves to depths of compassion
just to be touched.

I long to find her
bring her back whole
to let you in & feel
time expand & contract
as-if we were one.

Despair leaves her wanting.
Holy moments
of magic come & go
Mary holds on, buries herself
in Jesus’ warm arms & hides.

Two lovers lament
looking for something
& leave with nothing; numbness
held in a vice-like grip.
Begone!

Time, will ignite
the cosmic fire
that drew them together. Love,
is bigger than what they once
knew of love.

If I surrender, we can
let go — trust
universal intelligence &
rebuild the architecture of life
in our own image.

Mother Mary is finding her way
& it is already written in the stars.
Jesus IS the way, the truth
& the light.
Ours is creation.

© Copyright 2021, Poetry Out West, Jodine Derena Butler. All rights reserved

Famous Last Words

In the event of an imminent thermonuclear war, all we can do is watch,

& wait.

We wait for the sun to rise in the East – Putin, putting on the ritz, while the West opens their vintage wardrobe & rummages through threadbare tassles, choking on clouds of faux fur.

We, watch & wait

witnessing White Helmets filming fake news, staging fake attacks, doing God’s dirty work not dissimilar to Custer’s last stand.

Still, we watch

& wait,

while royalty fight over the spoils; children picking bones apart, the rise of Zion (Judas) & the damnation of Mother Mary

respectfully, although they both feed off one another like zombies in a blood bath.

Watching & waiting,

for the irony of it all to become clear. The penultimate finale – being surrounded by the proverbial white light.

Fucking bastards!

The last sun ever to set in the West, leaving everything we knew behind.

A spectacular sunset, followed closely by a long, dark, cold, post apocalyptic nightmare.

*

I for one, watch

scanning the horizon willing it to rain,

waiting

for a new dawn.
© Copyright 2018, Jodine Derena Butler & Poetry Out West. All Rights Reserved

Power

Disrupt

There is Nothing Special about Mary

Photographer: Judith Bender-Jura

1.

Mary, the one without
a Halo – a married whore,
found unconditional love
hiding in the soles of His feet.

After the fact – that
pseudo relationships
took precedence for a while,
she washed Him clean

for no other reason
than to show respect, reverence
for one that would give
His soul for her.

2.

My feet are bare, scarred
by broken beer bottles and red
blood paint – tips to toes,
manicured to perfection once

upon a time. his feet
are cold; numbness held in a vice –
like grip, as she works her way up
past calves & quads seeking

warmth in the apex, comfort
sucking a thumb – print. embedded
ecstasy applying pressure
where it hurts, to ease the pain.

3.

She thinks the sun shines outback, cradling his head, healing hands
mindful of circular breathing; muscles
& tendons ache for release.

Mary doesn’t mind manipulating
bones, fingering the spaces
in – between, redirecting blood flow
to all the right places, kneading

stretches & burns ping – back,
sending signals like sparks, endorphins
take up the slack, ushering in sweet
sensation & nipples peek. there’s

nothing special about Mary, knowing
a thing or two, making money serving
more than a hand – full of life’s little pleasures. making hay while the sun

shines requires little effort on her part,
preferring to let it slide, up past
the point of no return. those days,
over now before they really took hold.

4.

Mary looks at him spent, kinesthetic
energy on standby as he reconsiders
where he stands. the party’s over,
someone has to clean up, Mary

learning to love the hand
that feeds her, wishing sometimes
for independence and silence, in –
between phone calls. those days

are over, up for tender for the next
wave of youthful antagonists who seek
an existence un – beholden. love
knows no rules of engagement.

© Copyright 2016, Jodine Derena Butler & ‘Poetry Out West’. All Rights Reserved

Impression

God is Love

I feel shattered
fragmented
my self dispersed
willy nilly
this way & that; sparks

on a funeral pyre

*

Isolated in a new country I proudly call my home, desperate for unconditional love and understanding. I am estranged from family who need no explanation least of all from me. We are grieving the loss of our precious little girl. The softest most gentlest child who has ever graced my presence. That’s the worst thing to comprehend. How could it all go so wrong?

Self pity and blame/shame become a toxic breeding ground for self-doubt.  Feeling victimized beyond where my psyche can find peace, I am being eroded from within. Still, those wicked thoughts work their way into my cracks, ever-widening, poisoning me from the inside out. I have a parasitic demon spreading its hideous tentacles into every mistake I have ever made reminding me of my foolish flaws. My lifesong is no more heard than those women in history; burned at the stake.

I thank God I was not born in that cruel Medieval era, although I recognise similarities in unjust sentences and we all know no one has a leg to stand on in times of prejudice. I see common sense, at the last-minute at least. Those women were tenacious, brave beyond measure and while the odds are gathering sticks stacking my pyre, my heart is with her and them, my love knows no bounds.

I make the calls, I speak my truth. It is all I can do to retain my dignity. My integrity is not in question, it has never been. I know right from wrong. There is  something insidious here at work, attempting to thwart justice by all devious means imaginable. It cannot last forever. She threatens me and us but though the system of things is corrupt, I am not.

Every day people are being dis – membered, crucified in the coldest places on earth. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy but she has brought us here to witness our incarceration and suffering, inflicting us with that cold, soulless stare. Her lust barely disguising her thirst for that elusive elixir of life.

I am human. I suffer like everyone else. My reserves are low and my inner flame is almost extinguished – doused by lies and deceit of the most heinous kind. I pray everyday for divine intervention. More than ever to Mary, to God, Goddesses, to the Crones, to whoever will listen. Those who weave their ancient threads on the great wheel of life, deciding our destinies.

By descending into hell, this time I know with certainty that wheel will rise again and I will find myself ascending, transcending all that was before. My faith wrapping my warm, safe, loving arms around her and us. I believe we are in the right place at the right time but the reasons for it are as yet unknown. I face this wrath. I take full responsibility for whatever I have failed to see and I will mourn.

My needs are the least important right now. Longer lives are at stake here. I am reminded of the Inquisition where women and poor innocent children were burned for nothing more than uttering truth in a world full of unscrupulous doings. My littlest princess is growing up way too fast. Her world separate from her self.

My focus is on one innocent child who is but a pawn in this farce. It is she who I admire, her resilience and the knowing that one day soon she will be reunited with love and have the best that love can offer her to heal. It won’t be too late, for love can work miracles for the most cruel of experiences. I have witnessed first hand how God will intervene having carried me in his stead before. Children are born resilient. They have inbuilt protection and I trust that she will be OK.

God is love and he does not desert his flock.

© Copyright 2015, Jodine Derena Butler.  All Rights Reserved

Rheumatic Stigmata

The bed creaks like your bones
that moan and groan
that slow grind through clenched teeth,
that need between the sheets

~

It’s August now
as cold as it gets here in Winter.
I’m buying an electric blanket
to warm you through; least I run you through
with my lasciviously pointy finger!

Still, I wrap my legs
around your freezing appendages,
making a spoonful of sugar
while you lick the cream
from your Cheshire 😀

I can’t help but bear your stubborn,
stoic Far North Queenslander pride;
pleasured simplicity, complicit
with your Will to burn the wick
at both ends, ajoint screaming
a string of profanity

In Summer, I knead
your splintered lamb shank
while you shovel nutrition down
with a tincture of mindfullness,
layer upon layer of oil, and Green Tea
setting the scene for a modern beer

I find it hard, to watch your tenacity
come face to face with Dachau – Grim
barking out his contempt
while she ducks for cover in sewage…

We have to make the trip worthwhile
or its all for naught; she signs a cross
Pope John Paul II raised the host
because he had all the respect in the world

for Mary.  Sometimes I wonder
what will become of our inheritance
if the light at the end of the tunnel
really is another oncoming train?

We have to find a way through
our fragile past lives where we would
seethe on the outside and cower on the in,
if it weren’t for temperance; sharp edges constrained by blunt force trauma

In the meantime, I heat the purple wheat bag in the microwave
laying it carefully between the sheets

You know I love you most when you least expect it

© Copyright 2015, Jodine Derena Butler.  All Rights Reserved

RE BLOGGED on Dream Big Dream Often

Abyss

I don’t recognise myself anymore

that fool
that blind stupid fool
whose face lit up and smiled
like Cheshire – following you everywhere

once

/

she saw the sun shine
out of your arse like a fractured halo and dared to love you

it’s gone

and all she can think about
is how to sign off
how to extricate herself
from humiliation; still
that cacophony of cackling voices

the concept of love is as corrupt and meaningless as the world in which we live

/

its not for me
I want out
I don’t want to look
for anything to look
forward to or to be reborn
only to have love fail –
rubbed in my face like spent semen
again and again
spoiled

how can love co-exist anymore than Buddha, Allah, Jesus or Mary?

/

love is blind
and refusal often offends
I want oblivion, finality
one painful life is enough for me

I swallow my insecurities
like my black and white thinking
allowing acid to corrode me from within
turning me upside down
inside out

/

I think about death and dying
like that single stone
that skipped a few beats
before it sank
out of sight
never to be thought of again

there is absolutely nowhere left to go
and I am like a shell of what I once was a hollow husk of withered cells
dying my slow and agonizing death
angry for being so magnificently vulnerable in contemptible
self loathing

and to think that there are those among us who want to live!

I should feel blessed – accept
except everything feels so jaded
burned and extinguished

life just isn’t worth living
sometimes
but I do

I struggle to see the light
shining on me when I am in pain

© Copyright 2015, Jodine Derena Butler.  All Rights Reserved

Mothers

Who says there is a God?
wishful thinking created by man
to control the masses; no
Mothers in sight – save Mary
but look
look what happened to her our Lady!
Mary Magdalene
will rise again
she will be known by all her names
fire, earth, sea and sky; Ishtar

we shelter in the rivers and forests
gathering all the sticks and stones

Mary emerald as the forest green
will ride with Rhiannon
her shoes of moss and lichen
her cloak of rainbow silk: transformed
eye’s like Innana shedding tears
as sisters mourn and do
& all that is dark and been before,
will shadow us no more

she has awakened in terrible wrath and has unleashed a whore

Kali destroys and  makes anew
Pele knows which heart is true
Abundantia  makes it very clear
there are no more second chances here

Gaia,  Papatuanuku and Ostara, forging ahead new life
Innana, Dana and Isis surrounding them with light
Athena and Mother Mary have much to undo and teach
Aphrodite, Ostara, Nemetona and Ixchel
Mothers of divine healing heart

all these Mothers will guide us through without the slightest flinch

she is all Mother and we recognise her full
we run with open arms, no fear
she restores our wayward souls with care
she cradles our broken hearts to weep
peace will be reborn again
where war has gone before with man
our raging rivers will forge and cut
ravage and avenge; our rivers
will shed tears of pain
new paths lest we forget

calling all our wonderous women
our voices banshee wail
we will hear them in our hearts full throb
and never fear again
here comes Persephone from the dark
the first to see the light,
Demeter fills an earthen jug that overflows with tears
she gently wipes her daughters feet to cleanse away her fears
and without Mothers no seed will grow
and so they must obey

but men are men, God or not
and evil still prevails
our Mothers cast all seeing eyes
and none shall let them pass
Zeus may watch with Ranginui
for both have known this day
Hades left enraged behind
his plans for her subdued
for she is with the Mothers now
a war he cannot  rule

Persephone is free at last
Who says there is a God?
for Goddess rule this world or ours
Papatuanuku birthing fruit
my Maiden showing me the truth, wary as she treads
my Mother prays the safest journey our Mothers forged ahead
my oldest Crone will rest her bones on her dying day
and sisters will be reborn again and again
woven waxed and waned

© Copyright 2010.  Jodine Derena Butler.  All Rights Reserved