Purple clouds mass along the horizon.
Sheet lightning crackles.
Black winds cut,
keen as an obsidian knife.
Out of the dark west she rides.
From the yellowing east she comes.
Her white flags fly to the north.
In the south her red fires are lit.
She speaks.
The rock peaks split.
She speaks
and the past is laid open.
She speaks.
A light rain falls.
She speaks
and the future rises,
vapor on her breath.
She speaks.
Death is real.
She speaks again
and death is not an end.
Photograph by Camille Seaman.