The Fruits of Silence

The Fruits of Silence
by Alexandra Seidel
When the wild and howling moon rose
he proclaimed she had more sense than foxes
but what are you to expect from a piece of rock
that envies the brightness of the sun?
She was the only she-wolf who had ever stolen
stars' light, heavenly fire; of course she was cursed.
All creatures in the wood feared her, feared her shadow,
feared her scent; they said when all the stars were hidden
behind clouds, she shed her fur walked in human-skin,
spoke in human babble-tongue;
Humans made her into stories of wrongness, a woman
with starlight in her eyes that can turn hands to claws
and lips to teeth to tear a man limb from limb
for the crime of idle lust
and humans hunt all that they deem wrong.
Between them, they were like chains and like stones
and like sharp-beaked vultures to her:
every night and every day, they feasted on her tongue.
The wild and envious moon pronounced
that for the crime of tasting starlight
this was acceptable, especially as she had more
sense than your common fox; in truth
her eyes that shone like stars
made him feel as if he might lose his light like
dandelion seeds in a storm--o, this gloom of darkness!--
better to steal a voice than to fear
a never-committed theft of light.

* * *
Alexandra Seidel spent many a night stargazing when she was a child. These days, she writes stories and poems, something the stargazing probably helped with. Alexa's writing has appeared in Strange Horizons, Uncanny Magazine, Fireside Magazine, and elsewhere. You can follow her on Twitter @Alexa_Seidel, like her Facebook page, and find out what she's up to at alexandraseidel.com.

The Shift

The Shift

by Alexandra Seidel

Shift the darkness like fallen summer leaves;
there is no more magic in a cast off skin
just like there is no more magic left in last night's dreams.

You can call me a girl of feathers and fur,
of changing light and light that never comes.
I am a girl that doesn't even keep her own bones,

breaks the length of her strides like sticks
and casts a different shadow
whenever she turns her back to the sun.

I like the shift best; it is the truth
of me that only I can know, it is my inside.
I am the heart in every new skin,

and the shift is the heart inside my heart. You
needn't fear the changeful nature of me; I
am not afraid either

of casting off again,
taking another,
of always moving another step.

* * *

Alexandra Seidel writes poems and stories of things that are imaginary and live in dreams. Mostly. Her work can be found in Lackington's, Mythic Delirium, Strange Horizons, and elsewhere. If you are so inclined you can follow Alexa on Twitter (@Alexa_Seidel) or read her blog: www.tigerinthematchstickbox.blogspot.com.

What inspires you to write and keep writing?

These days I’m never really sure where exactly inspiration comes from, nor can I predict when it’ll strike. I think that after a while, after many, many words, your mind is tuned to writing and constantly scanning for ideas in the background. When I first started out though, knowing that people other than me were enjoying reading what I wrote, that was (and still is, to a degree) what kept me working at getting better. So whenever you read something that you like, do reach out to the author and let them know you enjoyed their words!

Pomegranates

Pomegranates

by Alexandra Seidel

The Mother:
You will love me forever.
I fed you
before you knew what food was.
I sheltered you with my warmth
before you knew cold existed.
You will love me forever
even if you hate me.

The Lover:
A mother's love is not enough for a heart to grow.
Peaches do not grow forever, they ripen,
and when they're ripe, they are meant to be tasted.
You grew among golden fields;
you cannot stay in that kind of sun forever
and not burn.

The Mother:
He has darkness in him, he smells
like butterflies pinned under glass.
His charm will dye your golden hair and suck
all color from your face.
The embers of yours and his fire will die
like a blackbird heart cooling under February snow.
If you go with him, I will teach you the meaning of cold.

The Lover:
You cannot be ruled forever.
Children are only ruled forever if
they remain as children forever.
Yet your youth is not eternal;
your beauty is, in my eyes,
but like all the things that live,
it will be your privilege to die
and be cradled, be embraced beneath
that golden earth.

The Mother:
Eyes like cold bone he'll give you,
far away from the golden light of the sun
and the tenderness of barley fields!
You will love me forever
even if you hate me,
and you will sneak out of his char house
to see me when he sleeps like tulips sleep
even if you think loving him will be enough.
But it won't be.

The Lover:
You will see light like you never saw it before;
there will be shadows
and they will be like living things,
like breathing souls cut from brittle glass.
You grew up to think a seed, a sapling
were the most precious things,
but there are wonders living in the darkness
and I will show you.
Your eyes will bloom like fire.

The Mother:
A mother knows.
His kisses will birth a wicked pain inside you.
You will miss the sun
as seen through an oak leaf.
But a mother knows:
A million words from me
could not ward you against
the cannon ball hits of his kisses.
A mother knows:
You want to love him.
You will hate me.
You will remember
that you still love me, forever.

* * *

Alexandra Seidel dabbles in the alchemy of words. The results are less metallic, more inky: you can read them at places like Lackington's, Mythic Delirium, Strange Horizons, and others. If so inclined, you can follow Alexa on Twitter (@Alexa_Seidel) or read her blog: www.tigerinthematchstickbox.blogspot.com.

What advice do you have for other poets?

Read, but if you are here, you’re probably already doing just that. I have two more things that might help you. First, make lists. For example, list all the things you might find in a witch’s purse or all the things people can forget on a train. Second, some word association; look at the lists you made before and use those words, or pick something else.

This Should Be a Lovesong But Isn't

This Should Be A Lovesong But Isn't
By Alexandra Seidel
1
It is better to have loved, truly loved,
just once than...

Oh, Cupid,
shut your mouth. There are
no bones beneath the skin of these words,
no substance
to give flavor
to this wine. You
use arrows, Cupid, arrows,
and I don't want the scars.

2
Cupid hides his quiver, hides his bow.

She moves silver pieces on a chessboard,
counts the black squares and the white ones;
a huntress would cry tears for her,
a huntress
would send out her dogs
but she
believes as much in the huntress
as she believes in the arrowboy.

He who plays the game with her
is not sure he knows all the rules
and so
a scytheworth of the twilight pieces
tumble.

3
You know, Cupid, gravity.
Gravity
is cool.
It is
undeniable
undefyable
unyielding
and as strong as the mass that makes it.
What the hell is love to this?
You don't fall victim to those arrows of yours
and go
oh
I feel you suck me blackholestrong,
feel you pull my orbits tight
feel you strip
flight
from within my very bones,
no.
The arrow hits and you go
oh
my heart is light as nothing
and I fly like a cloud of pink dreams.

Save it, Cupid, keep your godsforsaken arrows
because I
need to be pulled
and not made fly.

4
Onceuponatime
a little girl was looking at the stars.
Princely these stars, thought the girl,
and the stars thought
not.

The stars
they ran (from her) as quick as thought,
they fell
and falling scorched the sky.

The girl looked up and cracked her neck
and burned her eyes
with fallstar fire.

The stars (it must be said)
lived
and so did the girl
and there was happiness in some everafter
but that has nothing to do at all
with
this
story.

5
She has this way
of cocking her head
when the chess pieces fall, and he
does not see the cue in it.

Oh, there is a passion in the game, there is;
but it is a beast with two heads
but it is solitary and cold
but it is kept and guarded like dragon hoard
but it is raw, bleeds,
smells of hurt like last week's dinner.

Cupid shuffles his feet in the background.
He looks at the woman
(and oh! these eyes!)
scratches his head
(and oh! his head!)
and pulls close his quiver
to check the arrows with poisonhead,
counts them, counts again.

Cupid
cannot see the scar
but feels it blackholeheavy
and yet
no arrow's missing.

6
Cupid, listen.
The good times go
like falling stars,
it's kinduva been there/done that thing.

I will not fly.
I will not bare my heart
for your targetpractice bowsnap, no.

Sure, I'll play
but this is just a game
and games are ended
with tumbling kings
and queens
who guard their hearts with blades.

I will stand
here
in this my center of the universe.

Seriously,
down with the bow.

7
O, this toughcookie lady.
Enough smack
to make me hold my ears,
enough wit
to make me doubt my arrowsmartness.

Enough there
to make me think my wings
of little use.

Go to the wild, run in the forest and hunt,
I would normally say,
but not everyone's born a huntress.

I would scar her heart with tenderness
but close to her
the fletchings break apart,
no wind, no thought
that would carry my arrows straight;

they are pulled
and I
can't pull them back.

8
She and he combine chess
with midsummer wine,
sweet enough to drown a king.

Cupid is in the shadows, cursing
(and oh! his voice!)
with unseemly words
(but still! so sweet!)

His bow's unstrung,
his arrows unfletched and he
in doubt of his glorious godship.

9
Oh, pick up your arrows
silly god!
Move on, it's what the rest of us do,
like you didn't know.

I'm good with the chess board, see,
the pieces are already reset.
It is okay, it really is.

I do have this orbit of me
this orbithome to call my own.

It is okay, it really is,
you can restring your bow
and move on to pastures
greener, say,
and more abundant with the googlyeyed.

Cupid, listen, theresagoodgod;
Cupid, listen, listen well:
we each and all can learn to fly
but to be pulled, that's the damnedest thing
that learn we can't.

* * *
Alexandra Seidel likes writing scary stories and poems. Incidentally, she also likes writing funny stories and poems; in the grander concept of things, that surely makes sense. Alexandra’s scary and/or funny writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Strange Horizons, Lackington's, Goblin Fruit and others. If you are so inclined you can follow Alexa on Twitter (@Alexa_Seidel) or read her blog:http://tigerinthematchstickbox.blogspot.com
What do you think is the most important aspect of a fantasy poem?
Just like any other poem, it should resonate with the reader on an emotional level. I do think that language should be used beautifully in a poem, that the poem should be made beautiful by the writing even if the subject matter is dark. Ultimately, finding beauty in language is what makes poetry an art form.

A Soul to Keep

A Soul to Keep
by Alexandra Seidel
1. Give me sustenance.

There is no food, she thinks, that can make me not hungry.

Nothing to sate her, nothing at all in the whole wide world. Of course the thing that plagues her, keeps her up at night, is much less a physical hunger, no empty stomach, but it still hurts and churns inside her as if it were. She still feels hollow.

* * *The first movement.

Everything begins. The question is, where does it begin, and how. To bake her Pfefferkuchenhaus, the witch from Hänsel and Gretel would first knead her dough with bony strong fingers while the oven was heating up, there in the clearing in the woods, no roof over her head to give her shelter from the elements.

Anne considers herself an enchantress, not a witch, and she weaves her spells differently, much less exposed to sudden changes of the climes. But like in that tale before the tale, there still is some kneading to be done before her frame of spells will stand firm.

Kneading here means Anne plans her days carefully: set my alarm early so I am already waiting as you reach the subway; stand close to you on the platform, not too close, but close enough to smell your perfume (vanilla and warm amber), close enough to carefully take an errant hair off your shoulder when your head turns the other way; close enough so my hand brushes against your fingers hidden in gloves as we both get on the same train, and so forth.

No, she is not a stalker. She has no need to stalk. Once the kneading is done, all the rest will follow, mouse to trap, trout to lure.

* * *
2. Give me meaning.

She calculates as follows: (all this, and nothing on a pale paper sheet spanning from here to now) On average, I talk to twenty-three people in the office, take calls from twice as many, and make polite conversation with maybe half a dozen people more on my way to and from work (the coffee shop guy, the neighbor, that sort of thing). I regularly flash a smile while talking to another person, at least once every thirty-three words. All in all, this means nothing to me, just wasted breath.

* * *
Look over one shoulder.

Anne has been named for Anne Boleyn. It was her crazy grandmother who told her this. Two things to know about Anne's grandmother: one, she was not crazy, two, she was to Anne both grandmother and step-mother. The last was the reason why granny did what she did to her husband.

Oh, they did not find Anne's grandfather/father for a long time, but once they did, that's when they started calling Anne's granny crazy. And other things.

* * *
The second movement.

It is a dance. Anne knows all the sad tales of witches, which is why she will not be a witch. Her feet are lighter, no premonition of burning iron in them. After all the watching, all the getting-to-know-before-knowing, she is now ready to make her cauldron boil and bubble, to call upon older and ancient goddesses, to call upon demons and saints. Her spell, it will not be a net but a snare, woven for one sweet ankle, woven of one errant hair collected off her shoulder.

* * *
3. Give me...this dream?

She usually sleeps fitfully and little, no dreams that rattle the clicking abacus of her mind, but not tonight. Tonight, there was a succubus in her dreams. Tonight, she smelled strawberries and crushed pepper, almond oil and blooming lavender, tonight she felt skin rub against her skin, felt the foreign smells grind into her. She even kissed lips fuller than her own, felt and touched and tasted sap and blossom and flower and...there was less hollowness in her when she woke, no less than half an hour later than on every other day before this.

* * *

Look over the other shoulder.

Anne grew up with her grandmother before she was declared crazy, and after that, Anne moved in with a great-aunt who knew what she was, understood as much as anyone can understand. Oh, not the incest-rape child, not that. The witchling child, that is what great-aunt Silla knew and understood, and she whispered Anne's ears read with all her lore-lessons, all her cauldron deep wisdom, all her eggshell truths.

Even after all those years, Anne is convinced that she can hear Silla's voice when she doesn't know that she needs a truth that leaves shattered eggshells in its wake; when she needs the lessons spelled out clear and simple.

* * *
The third movement.

This is why she is not a stalker. She waits on the platform, same as every other morning, but today, she is less invisible than ever before. Today, there will be more than an innocent brush of finger against glove. Today, the oven smells like fresh bread and the Pfefferkuchenhaus stands ready in the forest, waiting to meet teeth and tongue, waiting to meet the tempest and be the temptation.

* * *
4. Give me.

There was always an abacus clicking away in her head like a whip. What must she do, what must she say, and to whom must things be said and in exactly what way. How must she smile the smile of masks, how must her lips tilt while her guts wreak havoc inside her. Today, the abacus is silent, the wooden beads stuck in the gears of her fleshy heart.

The subway sounds like an echoing well, reminds her of clear water.

She sees the gold-brown eyes shining like beacons, the braided hair like fire on a mountain top, and she is enchanted instantly by those lips fuller than her own.

Half a dozen people to and from work who she small talks with each day; not today. Today, there will be real words, real thoughts, real smiles shy as a black cat. And if she is very lucky, words and thoughts and smiles will be drowned in those golden-brown eyes. Today, she will fill her stomach and never let it go empty again with the relentlessly hollow rhythm of abacus beads.

* * *
And tomorrow.

The enchantress does not know her own story after the ever after. Anne Boleyn did become a queen, and there was a happy time on that throne, but it wouldn't be the first time a cunning spell was cut short by an unsheathed blade.

The former abacus girl has stopped counting, but certain numbers do not leave us, certain dreams are not lived beyond the realm of poppy sweet sleep.

Shh, quiet, make no sound; hear eggshells trembling before they crack, before they break; hear wooden beads oil themselves in tears before they start running the numbers again.

* * *

Alexandra Seidel dabbles in the alchemy of words. The results are less metallic, more inky: you can read them at places like Lackington's, Mythic Delirium, Strange Horizons, and others. If so inclined, you can follow Alexa on Twitter (@Alexa_Seidel) or read her blog: www.tigerinthematchstickbox.blogspot.com.

Where do you get the ideas for your stories?

I wish I knew! Most of the time it just happens though, you either find there’s a character living in your mind and they want out, or there’s some plot idea that won’t let you sleep. I don’t have a formula, but I do suspect that living life is where fiction starts.

How to Kill the Juniperman

How To Kill The Juniperman

by Alexandra Seidel

i

The augur speaks felicitations against the stinging moon.
She holds her screams like water in a sieve,
holds holds
holds on
but the juniper tree's shadow is long.
She names one daughter,
but has found the silence
when the midwife asks for a second name.


~Intermission~

Lonely as hills,
but why is there no peace
in a mother's old age?
When they are small
our worries are small
and when they grow up
the worries just grow
What is left for a mother
when they die?


ii

In our house
the shadows spoke.
The darkness spoke
and sang lullabies to me at midnight.
Grandmother said
mother died with my name
strong on her lips.
A shadow at grandmother's eyes
tells me
she does not tell me all.


~Intermission~

Her tongue was juniper black
(and everyone knows the Juniperman.)
Her half beating heart was torn to one
(and everyone knows it was Juniperwords
that swallowed that second beat.)


iii

Grandmother says
fathers are for those who live in the village
not at its fringes like we.
She tells me
having a father
turns the other children into ugly beasts
and that's why they do not like me.
They would throw stones at me,
Grandmother says, if they weren't
so afraid
of the shadows.


~Intermission~

Oh sweet daughter's daughter,
can you forgive me
that I was late?
Too late to safe your mother
from a wolfish juniperman,
too late
to still superstition's murderous hand?
You are shadow
and I am sorry for that.


iv

Grandmother left
the other night,
a quiet night,
not too warm, not too cold,
just mellow, the smell of juniper thick in the air.
The house is a cave
The village a murderous sea
The shadows whisper
but my ears are swollen with the
beetlestings of my cries.


v

Time aches like an ointment along my face.
Not yet twenty times twelve moons
and I am already lonely as hills.

(Hills are strong, they may hold echoes
if there is someone to just speak a word.)

There is a new augur in the village.
He is young and unafraid.
Augur's have no fathers
and they do not consider
throwing stones.

The Juniperman, the Juniperman!
Run, bright girl,
it's the Juniperman!


vi

I would not have thought that his skin
tasted of juniper. Beneath him
I was warm and not alone.
The shadows call him wicked,
curse his sacred bones with secret tongue;
The darkness calls him foul,
sings songs of warning to me
at midnight when my augur sleeps
and when I wash the taste of juniper
from my swollen tongue.

The Juniperman! The Juniperman!
Run, bright girl,
from the Juniperman!


vii

Ten traitorous moons, I would die
in ten traitorous moons.
The augur--my augur, hah!--does not need to spell it out.
The shadows knew, the darkness knew,
but, oh, Grandmother, I was lonely.

Ten moons.

Ten moons of traitors, indeed;

unless I leave this
house, this home
with starlight whisper in my hair.
Grandmother, I will leave your bones behind
and take the words of shadows and darkness with me;
I will run
and the dust behind my back will call:
Ten traitorous moons!
and I will turn,
my arms a cradle,
will laugh the dust to moonthick clouds
and I will say: ten foul traitor moons,
but count them with me
count out loud
a thousand thousand victorious stars
and the darkness between them singing
and the shadows around us
thinning.


epilogue:

Behold the Juniperman!
his tongue, once strong,
now wilting
as the shadows are thinning and thinning
and the stars out in the sky
bright and shinning and spinning.

* * *

Alexandra Seidel dabbles in the alchemy of words. The results are less metallic, more inky: you can read them at places like Lackington's, Mythic Delirium, Strange Horizons, and others. If so inclined, you can follow Alexa on Twitter (@Alexa_Seidel) or read her blog: www.tigerinthematchstickbox.blogspot.com.

What do you think is the attraction of the fantasy genre?

Fantasy is awesome because for the most part, anything goes. Ever wanted to read someone's mind? Fly? Breathe underwater and swim with merfolk? Fantasy takes all of these daydreams and put the imagined worlds on paper for others to read and share. I guess there are things that are more amazing, but the fantastic worlds of fantasy are still pretty high up there.

You Are a Ship

  You Are A Ship
by Alexandra Seidel
She said, you are a ship, and I am lost inside you.

* * *
This is it, you are changed forever, and things will never again be what they once were. It was an ocean that came, and the ocean found you, sand and blood your bed, and you decided to change.

The wood was once your bones. Now the planks are strong against the salt. Each morning I find that you open my cabin window to let in the light of sunrise, the smell of brine riding on a rascal sea wind. If I knew a way to ask, I would ask you is it hard being a ship? But I do not know the words in your language, the language of things made to go into the waves, and so I keep silent.

When you were still human, you asked me my love, will you wait for me? and I am waiting, still.

* * *
She said, by the steel you gave and the blood you took, return to me the one I love.

* * *
I am not a sailor, but I know that you should have sails. What you have are shredded things, hanging in the wind like sword-cut flags that bleed their colors as if such a thing could make the wind give peace.

I am not a sailor, but I also know that the wood that was once your bone should not howl like it does in the night as if haunted by terrors of fire and steel.

I am not a sailor, but I know that if you keep with the salt and the wind and the waves, you will break, and you will take water, and you will sink.

* * *
She said, I will go where you cannot go; this is the price I pay for love.

* * *
Hush. The Underworld is heavy with the fresh smell of blood and steel, fire and salt. New shadows have not yet settled into this home of homes, I think that they are still afraid. There are no more kings here, no more queens, just thin and thinly stretched lines of fate that we may hold on to, if we dare.

I find you, bled. I find you, cut. I find you, burnt. My love, you are not whole, you are like the statue of a giant, broken up and scattered across the entirety of the Underworld.

I find many parts. I find all the parts but one. There is a part of you that went away, like Ophelia went into the water. I understand now; this is why you chose to become a ship rather than return to me as a man. I am angry beyond anger, because you chose the water. I am angry because the water chose you. But no matter how angry I am, I cannot bring myself to blame you for any of it.

* * *
She said, with all the parts of you but one, I ascend, and even though I know the Ophelia-you is still behind me, I do not turn my head.

* * *
Without a sail, you are just drifting, and I with you. You, the ship, and I, the not-sailor, what a pair we make, left with nothing but ocean, a rudder, and an anchor! But I have spoken in a quiet almost wood-like voice to every plank and every nail, have told the you-ship that we will be looking for the sea-creatures in the depths from now on: the snakes, the sighing whales, the dextrous krakens, and yes, the elusive female shapes that swim in the beneath and come up so very rarely to find a quiet point in the ever restless waves to bring them back from the deep, the songs and memories of before.

* * *
She sings, you are a ship, and I will learn to sail with you; you are a ship, and I will show you how to stitch your sails back together until they fear the wind no more.

* * *

Alexandra Seidel dabbles in the alchemy of words. The results are less metallic, more inky: you can read them at places like Lackington's, Mythic Delirium, Strange Horizons, and others. If so inclined, you can follow Alexa on Twitter (@Alexa_Seidel)or read her blog: www.tigerinthematchstickbox.blogspot.com.

What do you think is the attraction of the fantasy genre? 

All the possibilities! Of course you need a functioning plot and a good main character, but the setting, the rules, the societies and people in the (or outside of them) can all be what you want them to. Also, with fantasy there are so many sub-genres that make the whole thing even more fun to write.