The Half Woman Earth Theater

The bells struck twelve
Blithe tiny creatures with speared fingers
dance in circles
around her brain
The brain that’s meant to work so well
Cutting little wells of irritation
into it’s surface
She doesn’t know what to think

At one
The Half Woman Earth Theater pulls back its curtains
Pulls back the neurons for successive thought
In the spotlight she stands, alone
Her toes in pointed position
Her arm on axis from her chest  
Anticipating the trumpets
Her anxiousness bound by practice
And repetition calming her tempered neves

At two
Her nose starts bleeding
Looking down,
it drips onto the snow
A blood bubble
inflating itself through dedication
Without thought

At three
The deep drone of the trumpets blows
Guiding her motion
The torso widens with breath
as the spine succumbs to compression
Shortening with laughter and pride
And through ecstatic flights of power
Her legs disperse
Growing roots at their tips
Ripping their way through the frozen ground

At four
Something’s missing
It seems to have slipped off during a twirl
Saddened by loss
Saddened by incompletion
The back hunches forwards
Wilting like spinach
A slighter womanly presence
No aura no glow

At five
Deficits in the roots
She falls over
Laying there
In exhaustion
Looking into the dark sky
The music ends  
Closing her eyes
Catching her breath as she is
pulled into the blood bubbles’
permeable membrane

At six
the thick velvet curtain closes
Sweeping of the dust
Oiling of the floor
Scrubbing of the dissembled parts
The pipes and the valves and the caps and the slides

The Half Woman Earth Theater