Tonight I went to my altar,
and found the vow I had written to Kali
and inserted in her right hand about 3 weeks ago.
I wrote it on a small piece of paper torn from a flyer
advertising private sessions with Gabriel Cousins.
It had a lot of ink on it.
The vow had read-
?Kali Ma- wherever you lead me, I shall follow.?
The vow had fallen into the sesame oil lamp placed at her feet.
The vow was saturated in oil,
And now looked like a large bug
That had drowned in viscous wishes
I took the bug,
Touched it to a flame
And placed it in the copper fit pit at my feet.
As I watched it burn,
the air was sucked out of my chest.
I looked into the fire pit and the vow had become my body, burning and smoking
like crazy.
I saw my body, burning in the bed of ashes
A putrid chemical smell rose to my nostrils
I watched the curling of smoke, rising from the pit,
wishing, indeed, this was my body,
changing into the formless.
I wondered if I should light a stick of incense to neutralize the odor.
Neutralize the contemplating.
And make everything rosy again.
When the fire subsided
the form glowed dimly for a while.
I touched it lightly
and it fell into the pile of ash
that represented my worst.
I did not feel burnt.
I did not feel transformed
I wondered if Kali had led me to this
perhaps symbolic action.
Or, was it a silly coincidence.
But something somewhere was different
from witnessing the burn
I cannot put a finger on it.
I cannot put a name to it.
So instead, I touched the ash to my forehead
And hoped for the best.