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Heavenly Bodies, or Foxglove Medicine, Apple Blossoms and Lost Girls Grown Old, by Elisabeth “Bettie†Barrie
Three heavenly bodies, caught up
In a constellation of consummation,
As our bedroom becomes a cocoon of cuddling.
Dream’s playful kisses always somehow feel stolen, even when they’re bestowed with permission, as though he’s tricking them out from under me. The proudly mischievous little lad grin on his smooth, sweet, beaming face does nothing to dispel this notion.
April’s teeth nip, and her lips lavish, my exposed skin with a devouring passion, possessing me with an assertiveness that belies her anxieties. She’s thought this through, and is hungry for experiences of flesh to replace her rehearsals of fantasy.
My mouth maps the contours of April’s generous curves with an explorer’s enraptured fascination, and my tongue discovers the sensitivity of Dream’s ticklish spots with a gleeful retribution. I drink in their youth and savor its tartly bittersweet taste.
He is our daydreamer, our dreamcatcher,
Our seeker and our shaper.
His influence constantly changes
His companions and the world in his wake,
Himself with it, and yet,
His core never wavers.
He is a walking paradox,
Every bit as relentless and impossible
As the perpetual motion machine
He was born to be.
He is our future,
Fantastic and unattainable,
Always slightly out of sync
With the rest of reality,
If only by a split-second.
He is our sun,
Golden and glowing,
A fiery, fixed point in our cosmos
That determines our own orbits,
With his irresistible gravitational pull
And his dangerously intense heat.
Even in bed, Dream’s stories never stop. His hands and voice rise and fall in matching dramatic arcs, as Hobbits and Sandworms intermingle with Jedi Knights and Time Lords, and names such as “William Shatner†and “Stephen Colbert†are uttered with as much reverence as the venom with which names such as “Joel Schumacher†and “Ann Coulter†are spat out.
April translates for me, but I’m surprised by how many of his references I’m starting to recognize. In ancient civilizations, mythology was a mixture of religious philosophy, political commentary and living history, so in that sense, he leads a mythical existence. Childhood entertainments, popular culture and current events feed his head. Metaphors, catchphrases and punch lines are how he comprehends and communicates with the world. He needs those screens, to deal what what’s real. He’s been running away from reality all his life, and now, he’s made of pure impossibility. I wonder when he’ll leave us behind.
She is our lifeline, our tether, our tightrope.
She walks that narrow tightrope
Between what can be and what we wish could be,
For while she encourages our flights of fancy
And adventures alongside us,
Her own whims and enthusiasms
Are tempered by hard-earned common sense.
She has never stopped reaching for the stars,
But she still stands on her tiptoes to do it,
Her feet never fully leaving the ground.
She is our present,
Ever mindful of matters
Both practical and pressing,
Keeping our daydreams
Connected to our day-to-day.
She is our earth,
Somehow steady and supportive
In spite of the speed
At which she spins through space,
Her inner landscape as rich and lush
And fertile as her abundant body.
Now that they’re married and the war is over, April wonders where they’re going to live. Of course, Dream sees no problem with alternating between their respective dormitory rooms at the University of Washington and his room at the Lair Legion mansion, but she wants a home, and with an infant daughter to raise between them, I can hardly blame her.
Her obligations of conscience have always doubled as outlets for her creativity, most notably when she’s disguised her identity by adopting a catchy moniker and donning a colorful costume to combat similarly clad adversaries, but this balance has been strained more than once. She lost her first love because his father was her sworn archenemy, and since her wedding, she’s been mending fences with her best friend, Bernice, who tends not to approve of “super-heroes†such as April. Bernice should take care in judging secrets kept by others, especially if I’ve read her own relationship with Sir Mumphrey correctly.
I am their mother, their mentor,
The warmth of their hearth.
His mother has loved him so much
That he shall never be able to function fully
Without a mother to love him,
And her mother has loved her so little
That she shall never be able to fill
The hole in her heart
That the absence of a mother’s love
Has left behind.
I am their past,
Fading but not yet forgotten,
Never again as active as I once was,
But enduring in their lives nonetheless.
I am their moon,
For while they might bask
In my incandescence,
They all too often fail to recognize
That my pale light
Is merely a reflection
Of their own blinding brilliance.
I’m pleased to hear that April finally persuaded Dream to watch the DVD box set of Pride and Prejudice, with Colin Firth as Mister Darcy, in spite of his protestations that it constituted “British faggotry.†I’m amused that he refuses to see himself in a man who deliberately downplays his finer traits, and is devoted to his vulnerable younger sister.
They ask about Wendy, and I’m gratified to report that she’s performing well at Hestia House, her continued insistence upon swearing and smoking in front of the children notwithstanding. I knew a Lost Girl could connect with Lost Children, but the more I see of these modern generations of children, Dream and April and Bernice and Wendy, the more lost they all seem. They’re so young, and yet, they all have such wounded, weary souls, like misplaced soldiers in a meaningless war, left shell-shocked by the mere act of living. I pull them gently to my breast, and they rest their sleepy heads upon my bosom.
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