A metaphorical scene about owning our inherent power and divinity, about sanctifying ourselves. Born from a poem I wrote a few years back.

Doing the Real Work

You may move bricks
dirt, dishes, paint, words
from here to there

meet privately with forlorn
whales in the southern archipelagos,
translating their melodic languages

or scan boarding passes for those
who fly with the urgency of swans
towards something that feels like love.

Perhaps you sit as a witness for the dying
or for the living who
do not yet know that they are dying

or do you pull things –
weeds, teeth,
thick, heavy ropes.

The point is, it really doesn’t matter
what you say you’re doing
while on the clock

because I’ve seen you
through the shop window
late in the night, doing the real work

of polishing the crowns and
ironing the iridescent wings
you all arrived with.