That Solemn Mistress

Marjorie Wisler

 

It was a sudden,

dark awareness.

to hold my own

against a perpetual enemy:

                sustenance.

 

This mind neglected seduction

by this,

and only this foe.

                Anesthetized,

power suddenly is conceived.

 

At last arrive the ramifications:

                a howling torso

                molars:

                aching for want of bolus.

 

I feel this machine

slowly swallowing itself up,

 

and I watch from my eyes

while the looking glass replies:

“You are less of a human today.”

 

***

Marjorie Wisler is a musician, teacher, and writer from the Midwest, living each day to serve and create. She grew up on the Mission Field, on the side of a mountain in the South Pacific. Her life experiences are the inspiration for all that she writes: the joy, sadness, love and heartache of each passing season color her ever-changing schema.