Hubris

Cycles

October 31, 2011 /

Waking Point

by Helen Noakes

“There is no death. How can there be death if everything is part of the Godhead? The soul never dies and the body is never really alive.”—Isaac Bashevis Singer, “Stories from Behind the Stove”

Helen NoakesSAN FRANCISCO California—(Weekly Hubris)—10/31/11

 

And one day, I will be a witch flying with herbs

For love, for profit, for curses and for death,

Tucked in a satchel woven from a spider’s web.

 

I shall not tell you, then, that they are all the same,

These herbs for loving, profiting, cursing and dying.

I shall not tell you that I pick them from the same flower.

If I did, I’d weigh you down.

 

I’d fly until I was caught

In the naked branches of winter-dead trees

Until I’d swallowed a potion for love,

Which would profit me nothing,

But curse me to a certain death.

 

And when you burn me,

My spirit will fly

And my body will surrender to the flames

The ashes feeding the flowers

Another witch will gather.

Helen Noakes is a playwright, novelist, writer, art historian, linguist, and Traditional Reiki Master, who was brought up in and derives richness from several of the world’s great traditions and philosophies. She believes that writing should engage and entertain, but also inform and inspire. She also believes that because the human race expresses itself in words, it is words, in the end, that will show us how very similar we are and how foolish it is to think otherwise. (Author Head Shot Augment: René Laanen.)