I dreamt of nights where only solace exists.
Filling lungs upon inhale-
Only hints of mahogany incense.
The nights where, darkness crept low enough for me to kiss the cheeks of crescent moons,
Trace galaxies with my index;
feel smiles from
Oshun.

She watches me-
Watch waves clash relentlessly
Against mountains of limitless heights.

I flew within autumns wind;
Quenched my thirst with natures nectar.
Danced to heavens harps and
Defined passion through the soul of Venus.

Only amplifying loves intensity
Now, earth shattering.

Submerging myself within her waterfalls of purity
Baptizing my mental to be freed from insecurities -
I emerged, no longer mortal.
Owls eyes replaced mine therefore
Dawn no longer intrigued me.

Embracing the silence of this night
I've found tranquility in a dream.
Found life within the depths
Of days transition.


-Danielle.a.watson

It all started with a walk through a graveyard.
We came to sprinkle glitter,
we came to ring the claw bells,
we came to read the eroded epitaphs on 200 year old tombstones.
Instead we found a “working” aimed at killing someone.
A black bird without a head.
Lopped clean off.
Some kind of voodoo.
Consecrated with a dark blessing by a tombstone.
Naturally we took the bird home.
Laid it out back in the freeze.
It was a “working” aimed at killing someone.
A santera over on east King street informed us of the details.
Told us to burn it and take a sweet bath.
Told us to put water next to the door to catch the demons off our shoes,
tracking in all the demons off the street.
I put water next to my bed to catch the demons in my sleep.
I wondered to myself just what exactly was going on.

A cat got to the bird before we could
but it left us the wings by the fence in the yard.
Monica stretched them open and now they are drying in the garage.
A set of wings to fan the smoke once we light the sage on fire.
I didn’t have a good feeling.
I wanted to burn the black bird.
I wanted to stop the “working”.
I wanted to leave a green pumpkin for Oshun by the waterside.
But instead I only watched it lying on the leaves
out back under a tree
from the kitchen window each time I did the dishes.
Then one morning it was gone,
but I didn’t say anything.
I thought about other things until I saw
the stretched wings in the garage,
until I pulled the Raven card from
the Oracle deck.
Black birds came to visit me.
I was advised I better start getting crafty.
I had been diligent with the water by the bed.
I purified the demons with the singing bowl every morning.
I bless my demons in the water so they don’t use
my mouth to scream
and my eyes to cry.
But the raven came to see me still.
The one without a head, and the one in the oracle deck.
And the ones that fly around the power lines outside where I walk,
cawing and cackling in a crooked ******.

Fancied myself a priest
baptized by the Holy Spirit
home of the Sacred Feminine.
Found myself screaming in hysterics like a little boy in his blanket
after he's told nothing shall be as it was.
So much for the priest hood.
So much for the New Earth.
I pulled the Tower Card.
And that,
along with the ravens
and old man Saturn…
I had never been so afraid for my body in my life.
Now we walk around town and find bird heads on the sidewalk.
Starlings, and a little wren.
I learned my demon’s name is John and that he stands behind me.
Big and wooly like a wild thing on two legs.
He doesn’t fit in a glass of water
so I brought him to the Lemon Street Cemetery
and said bon voyage.
Buried him by a gravestone tree stump and said the prayer of two deaths.
The walk home smelled like ginkgo nuts
and the dust from the crumbing of the Tower hasn’t settled yet.
Now it’s as if I've been inoculated.
I lost my sense of taste for a week and didn’t break a sweat.
I’ve pulled the rug out from under my own
two feet so many times
that if I don’t learn to levitate
my poor tailbone won’t have a chance to heal.
Home of the root
Abode of the World Serpent.
I wasn’t prepared for what was awoken within me
that day up in the promised land,
and it's been climbing my spine ever since.
Now I bless the water by my bedside every night
in case John comes back to roost.

I cover my floors with happy feet
I paint the walls with candle light
I light frankincense and tie prayers to the smoke
I watch them float to heaven
I ring a singing bowl
I put the demons in the water and I drink them.

Say baby, can I be your slave?
I've got to admit girl, your the **** girl
And I am digging you like a grave

Now do they call you daughter to the Spinning Pulsar
Or maybe Queen of 10,000 Moons, Sister to the distant yet
Rising star

Is your name Yemaya? Oh hell nah, it's got to be Oshun

Ooh is that a smile me put on your face child?
Wide as a field of jasmine and clover

Talk that talk honey, walk that walk money
High on legs that'll spite Jehovah
****, who am I
It's not important
But they call me brother to the night
And right now I am the blues in your left thigh
Trying to become the funk in your right

Who am I? 'll be whoever you say
But right now I'm the sight ***** hunter
Blindly pursuing you as my prey

And I just want to give you injections of
Sublime erections and get you to dance to my rhythm
Make you dream archtypes
Of black angels in flight
Upon wings of distorted, contorted metaphoric ****

Come on slim, **** your man, I ain't worried about him

It's you who I want to step to my scene
Cause rather than deal with the fallacy
Of this dry *** reality
I'd rather dance and romance your sweet *** in a *******

Who am I, well they all call me
Brother to the night and right now I am
The blues in your left thigh, trying to be the funk in your right
Is that alright?

by: Larenz Tate

I am her. She is me.
Look into my eyes, the soul that stands,
is unrecognizable.
The shift of Oshun causes my femininity to create chaos,
causes my femininity to sky rocket into
the space that many can not reach.
INFINITE love surrounds this entity so be careful where you step.
My presence will change you.
Beware.