i. Kindred

Beside a river she lit a match and called her
     mother a whore, honeyed thigh bones enlightening
     the crone with what drew her from her throne, cracked femurs
     caressed back together by childlessness bending
     fragrant shadows over moans with its embers she
     held firm, transgressing fetish to touch to condemned
     flesh sulphur-kissed tips of edible plants armies
     and vultures gathered in wastelands, faggots foul wind
     turned to pens, writing on leather what daughters ought
     never confess, this strain of desire affliction
     itself cleanses with smokeless fire, no water sought
     when women drown children in thoughts lost once written,
     so she burned into her ancient skin what shared past
     made of them a mosaic face veiled in wet ash.

                                        ii. Kiln

Saying of providence that his hidden hand must
     wither under the unrelenting prescience
     of her intoxicating presence, that his lust
     for such an enchantress was his undoing since
     fatalism waits for no one and does no justice
     to moments such as those still unfolding, terror
     thrown from clouds to show us our failings, life’s crevice
     the precipice into which we fall, the air our
     witness, judge, jury, and executioner when
     we lose our balance, just as those proud worshippers
     of desert flame came to be burned, failing to tend
     their fire temples, examples made of them by her,
     she who leapt from shame into fame’s shallow chalice,
     crashing fast from glory’s promontory palace.