marie lecrivain

five cardinal points

Maid of the Southern Cross

She reeks of corn; flaxen hair, a fine dusting of blond on her full upper lip and tanned arms. Her scent is the clean, desperate sweat that naked kernals emit when the green veil is ripped away and then exposed to a boiling pot of water.

She desires to orient herself in the opposite direction; toward the 2 pm trajectory of the warrior whose afterimage is branded into her pe-ripheral vision, but she doesn't know how deep her roots run. She only knows that the wind bows her in his direction from the waist up.

She is ripe for the plucking... but it will be another; the praticed, sensual hand of a Reaper who will carress the silk of her wanting, cut her from the stalk, and then toss her into his rucsack along with the other maids.

Southeast Wise Woman bound Three Degrees to Antares

She is the intermidiary. Her bifurcated vision and lunarosity are hidden under a long fall of dark hair which doubles as both armor and wings.

Today, she removes the third eye hidden in the lower left quadrant of her heart. As she places it in the hollow of her throat, her roving peridot orbs immediately orient on their proper axis points. She re-gards the desperate hope of the Maid, who's come searching for the key to the hidden path.

She's hesitates. Suspended between the worlds of noon and midnight, she knows anything she says will be regarded as little more than va-porous nonsense.

Love can't to be found at the end of a comet's tail.

Dissatisfied, the Maid wrinkles her nose, and then departs. She's not privy to the long, bone-shuddering sigh that emenates from the wise woman, who, with a single stroke, gouges the third eye from the hol-low of her throat.

Northeast Son of the Morning Star

He's the catalyst, the harbinger, the spiral crowned child born out of passionate, deliberate chaos.

In his right hand he wields the spear oriented toward Venus in the ancient manner. His cupped left hand overflows with an unending cache of tears. His long, narrow steps instictively traverse the gematria that Prestor John once walked.

Though his pure, cobalt-blue gaze is fastened on the horizon, he's unaware of the enraptured masses who pursue him; the many hands that reach out to capture the brightness of the burning sparks that shoot forth from his feet, the searing pain that burns through every capil-lary, the deep sigil of a bird's eye left on each and every palm. He's oblivious to the estatic mournful cries as he speeds through the cornfield, the unified shriek of the maidens whose wombs he will never enter.

What holds his eye is this; a roving eye; a veil of green; a pale, strong hand, open and outstreched. This disparate trinity causes him to speed up his steps. There is little time left... this is the last time.

Northwest Warrior Rising

Blue-eyed and earnest, he takes a moment to carefully clasp his right arm across his chest to caress the barely healed wound.

Fleet of foot, he runs in joyous abandon, in love with his growing prowess, his strength and speed increase as he closes the gap between himself and the daily parabolic arch of the Sun. Periodically, the wound throbs, a threat to his progression, but he ignores it, certain of his youth and bravado. There is nothing he cannot do, no path he cannot travel, no star he cannot ascend.

Once, he dares to look back over his shoulder. A pair of large, sage-colored eyes smile at him. A slick, fetid hand palms the small of his back and pushes him forward. Off-kilter, he desperately tries to throw back his shoulders to counter-balance the effect, but he falls forward too fast, head over heels, and then prone into the dust.

Quickly, he springs up. His hand quickly clasps his chest and then pulls away. The wound is bleeding.

Southwest Doombringer

Owlish sage-coloured eyes blink against the morning sun. He curls his long, amphibious body into the shadows of the last Philospher Tree at the edge of the cornfield.

A drop of lyrical blight falls from his lips into the earth where it is sucked into the moist roots of the Tree. This bit blight travels at lightning speed through the capillaries of the Tree, shutting down an aeons old system of communication. The bark of the tree ripples in protest, its chestnut hue darkens to a burnt umber, then flakes off into bits of ash. The leaves shake, curling brittle into themselves, and then drop one by one to the ground.

Satisfied, he peers from the safety of the dessicated roots at the devastation. Somewhere, he knows the blind wise woman is weeping, that emptied place in her heart fills with bloody tears.

He smiles at the approach of the Reaper and beds down to rest, the death wails of the maidens a soothing lullaby to his ears.

the left hand of sensuality

In a sea of augmented flesh and black leather, I watch for ritual gestures: the inquiry of an arched eyebrow, heads bowed in accep-tance, and smiles bound in agreement.

I am bored. Even the sight of striped and recently disciplined flesh fails to arouse my senses. I find more enjoyment in the bottom of my cocktail glass and in the growing fuzziness of my vision. The room tilts and swirls as I swallow the last of my drink.

This has been going on for weeks. I dismissed my last sub, the fric-tion between us washed away with the last whack of my favorite paddle on his backside. He's been calling; 20 desperate, entreating messages left on my answering machine . . . and I've erased them all.

Tonight's revels are briefly suspended by a group of Algerian dancers and musicians brought here to tempt jaded and sybaritic appetites. Compared to the usual, frenzied movement of meshed bodies, these new-comers are calm, languorous.

A tall, veiled man stands in the center of the brightly colored cadre of women. I've heard that the men from Algeria belly dance, but this is the first time I have seen one. His dark eyes meet mine and glint with a knowing. He slowly inclines his head in my direction; a com-passionate salute to my misfortune, or a casual gesture of gallantry, I am not sure. Either way, I bow my head in acceptance . . . some-thing I have never done for another man.

The musicians, now seated, put pipes to pursed lips, and beat out strong pulses on hollow drums. The music rises – a dulcet, impetuous wailing of notes that curls around the outer circle of dancers, ca-resses their waists, sashays their hips, and sways their full and pendulous breasts.

The veiled man slowly spins counterclockwise in the center, head bowed as the circle of women moves faster and faster. His head then raises, and his eyes again meet mine. I can see a hint of a smile in his expression. He raises his arms. His long, elegant hands clap to-gether in time to the music.

The women move toward him, magnetized. Without breaking rhythm, he shares a lightning glance with each one, a brief encounter that de-fies description. The women become more emboldened; hips thrust for-ward, breasts heave, visages darken with desire. A smile flickers within his eyes; he is pleased.

Here in shadowy corners where third eyes enact karmic law, the danc-ers move among us like angels in a pit of iniquity. We pause as the women blossom around the whirling stamen, the tassels from his belt fan out and brush against their ripening hips.

Though drunk, it occurs to me I am encountering a truer form of lust than I have in all my explorations of crime and punishment, which has its own reward – deliberate, yet liberating.

Here, another has demonstrated to me the other side of the coin; with no pain or fear, he has achieved the same result.