Will She Be Able To Concoct A Potion Steeped With Her Inner Thoughts? by Hedy Habra

The Call, by Remedios Varo (Mexico, b. Spain) 1961

Will She Be Able To Concoct A Potion Steeped With Her Inner Thoughts?
                                                                        After The Call by Remedios Varo
 
She wants to step out of the valley of slumber, open her eyes wide to reach the stars,
dreams of letting her hair flow in the wind, see it rise in a fiery swirl to reach the stars. 
 
A spark in her heart grows into a flame that keeps her warm. She discards handed down
ideas would rather gather and grind herbs to form an elixir of liberation to reach the stars, 
 
wants her flame to swell, refuses to be immured like her elders who dwell for hours over
a new recipe for their husbands, become the perfect housewife unable to reach the stars. 
 
She needs to move like fire, water, and wind, refuses to be trapped inside the bark,
wants to rise in the cosmos, sublimate, swim towards unknown shores to reach the stars,
 
yearns to rest under the shade of palm trees, pine trees, bamboo, banyans, or a sequoia,
aware that leaves await the wind's caress to unleash emotions that would reach the stars.
 
She wishes to concoct a potion steeped with her inner thoughts and sprinkle it with fine 
mica and crystal dust till its shifting shapes reveal the answer to her quest to reach the stars.
 
When my mom stopped painting for lack of an art space, I'd see her bent over lampshades, 
vases, pottery, ceramic, mirrors, and small boxes, turning them into canvases to reach the stars. 
 
Hedy Habra

This was first published by Nūr Mélange: a ghazal anthology, Quitab Editions.

Hedy Habra's latest poetry collection, Or Did You Ever See The Other Side? won the 2024 International Poetry Book Award and was a Finalist for the Eric Hoffer Award and The USA Best Book Awards. The Taste of the Earth, won the Silver Nautilus Book Award and Honorable Mention for the Eric Hoffer Book Award; Tea in Heliopolis won the Best Poetry Book Award and Under Brushstrokes was a finalist for the International Poetry Book Award. Her story collection, Flying Carpets, won the Arab American Book Award’s Honorable Mention and was a finalist for the Eric Hoffer Award. Her book of criticism is Mundos alternos y artísticos en Vargas Llosa, She is a twenty one-time-nominee for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. https://www.hedyhabra.com/