I Will Never Overshadow You

A little myth and miss….

I will Never Overshadow You

We lay beneath a tall and ragged ash
our dark Yggdrasil, bearing heaven
with its frayed and fractal fingers
and serene above its tattered crown, Selene –

its branches are my father’s limbs, you said
sturdy, stern and strong enough
to bear aloft the corpse of Nut
his disapproving eye the Moon –

You took my night-sky-chilled hands
and kissed each Moon-struck finger
you are not my father, you sighed
you will never wrap me in velvet –
or pour me into four stone jars…

I caressed your whitened knuckles
I kissed the grey maria beneath your eyes
the taut down-turned crescent of your mouth.

I discarded masks of jackal, hawk, baboon
In favour of my human face…

I am not your father, I agreed
I will never overshadow you.