the avatar of hera.

my sister inherited my tears

like a failed science experiment she fell

into the vat in the walls ear-first

and instead of a superhero, i had made

a non-villain, faux-hero: anti-hero, they call it

but what do you call the last woman standing

after the fall of a house; when the four walls

you fashioned into a home shreds itself into strings

of a forgotten story with no body; what do you call her

when she tapes the edges of the ashes

like the ocean returning to the shore to collect

the sands washed away from inside her but even

in her liquid touch they run away like the spiders

from a fire in their nests; if she is like the grandmother

facing the hole in the dress with a needle, is she wrong

for recreating the story from memory? when she strays

away from the narrative: is she wrong? or is she

a lonely goddess resurrecting from the heart of stars?

when she collects herself, where are the magis

to welcome this new constellation? do not weep

for the lost nebula: she is heralding her own return:

she is coming again.

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First published in Circular Publishing.