Heartbeat Rage

Today you are the spark that lights a wildfire, 
the first shake of an earthquake, 
the first drop of a hurricane. 

Today you are reborn with fire bones and star eyes. 
You were born with greatness
already spreading its roots beneath your skin
and you have cared for it, 
cultivated it, 
allowed it to flourish. 
You are brilliance and blood and fire and tooth.

You came from nothing, 
and yet here you are today, 
standing on the precipice of greatness. 
Here you are, molten steel in your blood and embers in your eyes. 
Here you are, standing tall and unwavering. 
Here you are, hands steady like those of a surgeon's. 
Here you are, letting go of who you were
and becoming who you were always meant to be. 

Where darkness threatens to swallow the world whole, 
you are a spark above a bush. 
You are the hope that ignites. 
The hope that cannot- will not- die. 
You are the promise, the oath, the pact. 

A thousand years ago the sky cracked open
and ancient songs of war and victory spilled down. 
Blood and life once meant the same thing, 
as did war and love. 
I still remember the day that the ancient hymns fell silent
for there was no one left to sing them. 

Today, the ancient songs are alive inside you. 
They sing beneath your skin like thread unraveling your soul, 
like a seagull's wing slicing through the foamy spray of the sea. 

You cannot hear them, can you?
I can. 

They sing inside your lungs 
like the snow-frosts burning out the rot in your veins, 
like an orchestra of bullets sliding down a pane of glass. 

If I sang them for you, 
would you recognize the songs in your own bones?

They sing inside your throat 
like smouldering ash
and the wine-dark lips of the devil. 

Before you knew my name, before you knew who I am, 
you told me once that my voice
sounded like the crashing of the ocean
and the lightning of a hurricane. 
Like the rustling of leaves as raindrops
spill from their curved surfaces. 
If I sang the songs inside you, 
do you think you'd remember my voice? 

They sing inside your heart 
like the venom of a cobra burning sickly sweet, 
like a crow trapped in your chest
(with holy wings of barbed wire and shiny dark eyes).

Holy child, I have waited for you since the dawn of time. 
The sea was my mother and the sky, my father. 
I watched the birth of stars [I swear, yours was the prettiest of all],
and I watched life crawl from the ocean and struggle onto land, 
holding onto its beating heart with such passion. 

And I waited. 

You were born in a reed basket floating down a river. 
From your hand, staffs turned to snakes
and the valleys were filled with the blood of first born sons. 
Holiness lived deep inside you like a sword in the gut. 
Yours were rattled bones of porous hope. 
And you stood before the precipice-
an ocean before you and an army behind, 
and you lifted your hand and split the sea in half. 
I say, you are hope and gilded freedom. 
Messiah, bring me to the promised land. 
Messiah, you are the promised land. 
The coveted hope that rings true in their ears, 
the sun blindingly bright and the moon, soft in the night. 
Child of river reeds and summer hailstorms, 
you do not see the hope that you bring to these starving peoples. 
Yahweh may be their God, but you are their hope. 
The conductor through which they survive, that through which they thrive. 
Messiah, Messiah, you dream of angels with fangs and hope with wings. 
Child of river reeds and summer hailstorms, 
hope is synonymous with your name. 

You were born then with a sword in your left hand and a torch in your right. 
Your father stood above your cradle singing legacy legacy legacy. 
He handed you a bloodstained crown and you took it with pride. 
I whispered in your ear once, 
I said, "scream too loud to ever be ignored,"
and you took my wisdom and lived by it. 
To conquer the world was your dream,
you were born with greatness in your lungs. 
A leader the likes of which the world has never seen. 
They will call you, "Alexander the Great"
and worship your name like God's. 
When there were no moves left to be made, 
you flipped the chessboard and seized victory with your own two hands. 

You were born with humble beginnings but they are deceiving. 
Darling child, turn water to wine and faith into miracles. 
Your favorite word even as a babe was yesha (redemption, the angels sing). 
You've got blisters on your feet, dirt on your shins, 
sunburns on your neck and the taste of blood in your mouth (always). 
Everyone you touch burns like a blue star. 
Trout would become matzo if you asked. 
Reeds would become swords if you asked. 
When you cried in the garden, I watched your heart be strengthened. 
And yes there was blood- 
the earth split open, 
your holy soul pressing hard against your ribcage
to escape the tides of thunder inside you. 
Yes, there was pain.
Yes, there was storm. 
But you were not made for weeping. 
Love endures more than the augury,
more than the bones, 
more than the catastrophes too.
Death cannot hold you, death cannot keep you. 
With a crown of bloodied thorns, 
you will take your rightful throne. 
You were made for ruling.

You were born a princess in a patriarchal kingdom, 
so you took up a sword and slayed your family. 
The throne is all yours, darling. 
The throne is yours. 
You're the dawn that rises bloody
and wrecks ships in its wake,
but you're a siren too, somewhere
deep in the aching heart of you. 
I watched you drown in the smoke that bellows from your lungs
and yet, somehow, despite (or because) 
the flames that spill from your rib cage, 
you are bright enough to put the stars to shame, 
bright enough that children make wishes
from the embers that fall from your skin. 
The throne was only the beginning, 
there is starlight calling you, 
there is something beautiful waiting for you. 
A snake was wound around your shoulders
and your feet sank deep into quicksand.

Born of Apollo's fire-blood, Aristoclea, Aristoclea, 
Delphi calls you. 
Your Grecian soul hums in the morning fog, 
pressing against your ribcage like the ocean against the coast, 
you are your own master. 
And a young man came upon you
and asked, "What do you know?"
and you will teach him all you know. 
His name is Pythagoras, 
and he is your disciple. 
Aristoclea, Aristoclea, 
brilliance is in your blood. 

You were born with whispers echoing in your ears,
whispers of what has been and what could be. 
You rise, rise far above what they expect you to. 
Suffer for your creations, 
you will survive. 
Weave stories with a touch ghosting in unparalleled brilliance. 
You are a creator, a maestro of words. 
Every work sings with your passion. 
You dive dive dive deeper
as you craft your plays, 
craft your poems and your songs. 
You will tell stories
of heartbreaks and of humor, 
of reconciliation and of tragedy. 
Your words will change the world, 
for you are the greatest wordsmith of the English language ever seen. 

You were born beneath the stars, 
my father's soul humming beneath your skin
ever so brightly. 
One of six, one of five, one of three that survive. 
You swing a pendulum and it is steadier than your heartbeat. 
So you press a finger to the veins in your wrist-
your pulse bombinating beneath your butterfly finger. 
This is your history, this is your blood. 
You are stargazing, calculating, the gears in your mind whirring. 
Copernicus was right, you tell everyone you can. 
They bring you to the court and tell you to decry your beliefs. 
And you do. 
But beneath those lies, you whisper, 
"and yet it moves." 
They will lock you up in a tower high
and call you heretic, liar, unbeliever. 
But you do believe, don't you?
You believe in the blood in your veins
and the numbers in your mind, 
in the absolute evidence you have found beneath the skies. 

You were born in anonymity (no one will know your name, not at first). 
But you rise like I knew you would. 
You will inherit a country fracturing beyond your control. 
You have inherited a home in pieces. 
United we stand, divided we fall. 
Divided is your nation. 
Yet faith still lives deep inside you-
you tremble beneath the strength of your conviction. 
You will give this nation a new birth of freedom-
and you promise, this government of the people, 
by the people, for the people, 
it will not perish from the earth. 
You will not let it. 
Suffer beneath the weight of your promise, 
it will make you stronger. 
You stand on the precipice, 
trembling before your own greatness. 
This, this is your call to leap. 
Divided, we will fall. 
United, we stand strong. 
You will unite a nation fracturing. 

You were born in a land of ice and snow, 
in a land where only the strongest survive.
A war was raging outside your door, 
child the war calls you like a siren's voice. 
You are drawn drawn drawn to the military. 
So they give you a plane
made of wood and your unshakable faith. 
You smile, curved canines and glistening incisors. 
Rise, child, rise. 
The Germans cry out as you leave explosions behind you, 
they learn to fear the absolute power lead by your (wo)men. 
They scream, "BEWARE THE NIGHT WITCHES" 
and you laugh. 
Marina Raskova,
their cries are like blood in the water. 
You will show them the same mercy they showed the Jews. 

You are born with skin dark like the earth
and a heart beating (bombinating beneath your skin) with your passion. 
There are flowers in your hair and stardust in your soul. 
There is no elixir like the salted waves, 
the tide floods through your veins
like gilded freedom and wild wind. 
You dream of empty halls and crimson walls, 
and it haunts you. 
You underestimate the weight that sits upon your shoulders, 
the way it follows you down abandoned streets
until you're all the way home. 
You fight this endless fight
and you wonder, will this ever end?
The presidency is your burden. 
I promise, it will all be worth it in the end. 

Holy child, I have loved you 
since the first time nyx pressed her soft lips
to the dark soul of the newborn earth and said, 
from the old chaos, let there bloom new life. 
I have loved you shamelessly. 
You asked me once, 
what does forgiveness mean?
It means your hair dripping with spikenard ointment, 
it means your cheekbones aglow in the firelight, 
it means kiss me, we are all holy
and there is no reason to fear what comes next.