alchemy – Elena Nola, Poet

Record the measurement of time with graves
Not seconds, minutes, hours. From tyranny
Of gears we come unbound; we are not slaves
To counterpoint or linearity

Replace the wheelings of the stars with heat
A catalyst applied like key to lock
Consuming all the dry and obsolete
To turn the spiral faster than the clock

Submit to chaos and necessity
Of chance; the process cannot be contained
The irony of alchemy: to see
An end, but not the path by which attained

Surrender to a wider-seeing source
Oh, lord of ash and fire, with scent of stars
And roses formed of embers glowing orange
Incinerate what’s done; let it be char

Transform the darkest shadow so it turns
From emptiness to flame; as bright my light
So deep my dark, but even so, it burns
Black star invisible against the night

All courses are innately changeable
To start a phoenix burn takes just a spark
We hold this truth to be immutable:
Who carries soul of flame need fear no dark

~Elena Nola

This poem is one of my favorite things I’ve ever written. It’s a perfect form Petrarchan sonnet, and a poem that was adapted into that form from free-verse after I realized I had written 15 lines in something approaching iambic pentameter and with a very obvious question/answer.

It was originally published in Riddled with Arrows issue 2.3, Objects and Artifacts, in November 2018.

“The Alchemist”

No pointed hat nor sweeping robe required,
Nor lonely lamp-lit tower stabbing sky.
No pedant’s cant, archaic chant to ply,
Nor pestles filled with mortared coal expired.
The iron discipline of midnight fires
And winding dark roads walked alone, though, aye;
Unflinching yen to face the truth of why,
And burning will to manifest desires.
All I need for alchemy is my quill
And paper blank. I dip it in my vein
Of sorrow, let my sadness over-spill,
Transmuting into words my darkest pain.
A minor compensation for my ills,
To pages, not my soul, leave thusly stained.

-Elena Nola

Tag: alchemy

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