Lewis Chess Queen Replica, by Mark Wilson

Replica, Lewis Chess Pieces (possibly Norway, found in Scotland) probably 1200s

Lewis Chess Queen Replica

(In Memoriam: Amanda Colville, artist & printmaker)
 
Lewis Chess Queen replica, with
your ink-stained palm rested on
your delicate cheek; how you
tholed out life’s barbed pageant
 
& proved an embodiment of
Gaia: grounded, most powerful
agent on this checker-board
stage, & my game-changer. Your
 
silken shawl tented your Omega-
frame, as you took a smoke out in
your enclosed garden, ergonomic
in that herbarium. Queen of my
 
flesh: covenantal, yet declined
being co-habitant, your domain
only for you to know domination
over; even as you diagonally
 
overcame the cellular mutiny
within. An internecine war, fire
in your marrow. Strengthening
these things which remain, so
 
you proved the redemptrix, able
to galvanise time, a Titania with
flora & fauna responsive to the
adept Zen of your digits. Innate
 
Lewis Chess Queen replica, with
your ink-stained palm rested on
your delicate cheek; ah, how you
transcend life’s barbed pageant.

Mark Wilson

Mark Wilson has published five poetry collections: Quartet For the End of Time (Editions du Zaporogue, 2011), Passio (Editions du Zaporogue, 2013), The Angel of History (LeakyBoot Press, 2013), Illuminations (Leaky Boot Press, 2016) & Paolo & Francesca in a Colder Climate (Black Herald Press, 2025). He is the author of a verse-drama, One Eucalyptus Seed, about the arrest and incarceration of Ezra Pound after World War Two, as well as a tragi-comedy, Arden. His poems and articles have appeared in: The Black Herald, TheShop, Tears in the Fence, 3:AM Magazine, Anvil Tongue, International Times, The Fiend, Syncopation, Epignosis Quarterly, Mande, Dodging the Rain, The Ekphrastic Review, Enheduanna, Rasputin, The Writer Monk and Le Zaporogue.