Gilded Goddess

Gilded Goddess

Created: 2016 on the island of St. Vincent & the Grenadines

“From winged heel to cosmic crown, she’s amazed and astounded:
The fiery flow of her mohawked mane rivals that of any solar flare,
Here it billowed in the cross breeze between palm trees on cross streets.

Her lips were first warmed in the cores of a thousand dying suns
Then artfully immersed in orange blossom honey from the San Joaquin Valley
and smothered in cinnamon and fructose that’s been sprinkled with gold dust
mined from passing cosmic asteroids.
When she drew breath– a chill air was left; making frozen tundras of surrounding lands
when she exhaled– out rushed a botanical scented firestorm that would heat the earth back up again.

Gracefully suspended from each ear/ were a pair /
of golden satellite halos spiritually repurposed and commercially rebranded/
as oversized hoops—measured at twenty-four karats. /

In low orbit around her sinuous neck were several strands of Zeus’s white and gold/
lightning bolts/ Frozen / hand folded/ though hard as stone/
then braided into several shimmering slithering serpentine ropes. / “

–  excerpt from the poem, ” Gilded Goddess”  by Kareem Quow